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READINGS IN 

TEXAS HISTORY 









/ 

READINGS IN 


TEXAS HISTORY 

For High Schools and Colleges 

EDITED BY 


EUGENE C. BARKER 

Professor of American History in the 
University of Texas 


Part I 

Spanish and Mexican Texas, 1528-1836 
Part II 

Republic and State, 1836-1928 


THE SOUTHWEST PRESS 
DALLAS : : : TEXAS 


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Copyright, 1929 

BY 

THE SOUTHWEST PRESS 


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Printed in the United States of America 


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PREFACE 


Teachers frequently ask me to recommend a textbook in Texas 
history for advanced study. Unfortunately there is no text covering 
the whole field of Texas history. There is, however, a vast amount 
of periodical literature and documentary material suitable for high 
school and college classes, if only it were accessible. 

These Readings in Texas History are designed to meet the evident 
need for a handy compilation of significant studies and documents. 
The first Part covers the period during which Texas was subject 
to Spain and Mexico, including the period of the Texas Revolution. 
The second Part covers the period of Republic and State. 

The selections are chosen and arranged to make a reasonably con¬ 
tinuous narrative of the history of Texas, but the discriminating 
teacher will obviously make assignments to meet the needs of a par¬ 
ticular class, using the selections that are not assigned to the whole 
class as the basis of special reports. Such a book, judiciously used, 
has advantages over the organized, consecutive treatment of a com¬ 
prehensive textbook, for besides giving the varied point of view of 
the respective writers, it serves as an introduction to the rich stores 
of Texas history recently made available in special studies. It is 
hoped that teachers and students may find this volume useful. 

Eugene C. Barker. 


The University of Texas, 
Austin, Texas. 



CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

I. 

II. 


III. 

IV. 
V. 


VI. 

VII. 

VIII. 


IX. 

X. 

XI. 


XII. 


XIII. 

XIV. 
XV 

XVI. 

XVII. 


XVIII. 


PART I 


PAGE 

Spanish Texas, 1528-1821. By Eugene C. Barker . 3 

La Salle’s Settlement and the First Spanish Mission in Texas, 

1685-1693. By R. C. Clark. 10 

1. La Salle’s Settlement. 10 

2. The First Spanish Mission in Texas. 13 

The Location of La Salle’s Colony in Texas . By Herbert E. Bolton . 17 

The Spanish Occupation of East Texas. By R. C. Clark. 27 

Mission Life.. Translated by Mattie Austin Hatcher. 34 

1. Mission San Antonio de Valero... 34 

2. Mission Nuestra Senora de los Dolores de la Punta. 38 

Texas in 1819-1820. Translated by Mattie Austin Hatcher. 43 

The Beginning of the Anglo-American Settlement of Texas 

By Eugene C. Barker. 59 
Terms of the Mexican Colonization Laws. 73 

1. The Federal Colonization Law. 73 

2. The Colonization Law of Coahuila and Texas. 75 

The Powers and Duties of an Empresario . By Stephen F. Austin. 79 
Minor Empresario Contracts for the Colonization of Texas, 

1825-1834. By Mary Virginia Henderson. 86 

The Government of Texas, 1821-1835. . . .By Eugene C. Barker. 103 

1. The Eastern Interior Provinces. 103 

2. Early Local Government in Austin’s Colony. 103 

3. The Establishment of Constitutional Government. 111 

Descriptions of Texas. By Stephen F. Austin. 115 

1. Texas in 1828. 115 

2. Texas in 1831. 120 

3. Texas in 1833. 132 

The Character of the Early Texans. 

By Thomas White and Stephen F. Austin. 

Life in the Early Settlements. By Noah Smithwick. 

Stephen F. Austin. By Eugene C. Barker. 

The Development of the Texas Revolution. By Eugene C. Barker. 


135 
140 
147 
159 

The Law of April 6, 1830. 183 

183 

188 
194 
194 
199 
209 


1. Argument against the Law. By Stephen F. Austin. 

2. Petition for Repeal. By William H. Wharton. 

The Convention of 1833. 

1. Texan Grievances. By Stephen F. Austin. 

2. Defects of the Judiciary System. By David G. Burnet. 

On the Necessity for a Consultation. .. .By Stephen F. Austin. 


vu 


XIX. 






























viii 

CHAPTER 

XX. 

XXL 

XXII. 

XXIII. 

XXIV. 


XXV. 


XXVI. 


CONTENTS 


221 

221 

226 
22 8 
23I 


PAGE 

The Provisional Government During the Texas Revolution 

By Dudley G. Wooten. 214 

The Campaign of 1835. 

1. The Battle of Gonzales. By Ethel Z. Rather. 

2. The Capture of Goliad 

By George W. Collinsworth and Ira Ingrain. 

3. The Capture of San Antonio. By Edward Burleson. 

4. The Address of Congratulation. By the General Council. 

The Texas Declaration of Independence . 234 

1. Drafting the Declaration. By Janies K. Greer. 234 

2. The Declaration. 2 4 2 

Framing the Constitution of the Republic of Texas. 

By Rupert N. Richardson. 246 

1. Members and Organization of the Convention.246 

2. The Land Question. 250 

3. Work of the Convention: Completing the Constitution. 253 

4. Analysis of the Constitution.255 

5. The Mystery of the Official Copy. 258 

The Fall of the Alamo . Compiled by Eugene C. Barker. 262 

1. Travis’s Heroic Letter of Februray 24, 1836. 262 

2. Governor Smith’s Call for Reinforcements. 262 

3. Why Fannin Failed to Reinforce Travis. 262 

4. Travis’s Last Appeal. 264 

5. Almonte’s Account of the Siege. 266 

6. Santa Anna’s Orders for the Assault. 268 

7. Santa Anna’s Report of the Fall of the Alamo. 269 

8. Francisco Ruiz’s Report of the Fall of the Alamo.271 

Goliad . 273 

1. The Goliad Campaign. By Ruby Cumby Smith. 273 

a. The Orders to Retreat. 273 

b. The Division of Fannin’s Forces. 275 

c. The Retreat from Goliad. 276 

d. The Battle of the Coleto. 277 

e. The Surrender. 278 

/. The Goliad Massacre. 280 

2. Letters from Goliad. By John Sowers Brooks. 281 

3. General Urrea’s Account of the Goliad Campaign. 

Translated by Carlos E. Castaneda. 291 
The San Jacinto Campaign . 298 

1. Houston’s Retreat, the Battle, and Close of the War. 

By Dudley G. Wooten. 298 

2. Houston’s Official Report of the Battle of San Jacinto. 

Sam Houston. 305 

3. Santa Anna’s Report of the Battle. 

Translated by Carlos E. Castaneda. 308 

4. The ‘‘Runaway Scrape,” the Non-combatants in the Texas Revo¬ 
lution. By Mrs. Dilue Harris 316 


Book List . 
Index 


641 

645 


For Contents of Part II See pages 343-344 




































PART I 


SPANISH AND MEXICAN TEXAS 



READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


CHAPTER I 

SPANISH TEXAS, 1528-1821 

By Eugene C. Barker 

[This brief chapter is intended as a narrative outline of the Spanish occu¬ 
pation of Texas. The details of this period have been carefully and somewhat 
fully presented by the late Professor George P. Garrison in his Texas (Hough¬ 
ton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1903) and by Professor R. C. Clark, Professor 
H. E. Bolton, and others in special articles. Articles of particular importance 
are: Bolton, “The Spanish Occupation of Texas, 1519-1690” (in the South¬ 
western Historical Quarterly, published by the Texas State Historical Associ¬ 
ation, XVI, 1-26) ; Clark, “The Beginnings of Texas, 1684-1718” (published as 
Bulletin No. 98 of the University of Texas) ; Lilia M. Casis, “Discovery of 
the Bay of Espiritu Santo” (in Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Asso¬ 
ciation, II, 281-312) ; W. E. Dunn, “The Spanish Search for La Salle’s Colony” 
(in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XIX, 323-370) ; Bolton, “The Loca¬ 
tion of La Salle’s Colony on the Gulf of Mexico” (Chapter III, below) ; Buckley, 
“The Aguayo Expedition into Texas and Louisiana, 1719-1722” ( Quarterly of 
the Texas State Historical Association, XV, 1-65) ; Austin, “The Municipal 
Government of San Fernando de Bexar, 1730-1800” (Ibid., VIII, 277-352) ; 
Dunn, “Apache Relations in Texas, 1718-1750” (Ibid., XIV, 198-274) ; and 
Bolton, “Notes on Clark’s ‘The Beginnings of Texas’” (Ibid. XII, 148-158), 
“The Native Tribes about the East Texas Missions” (Ibid., XI, 249-276), “The 
Spanish Abandonment and Reoccupation of East Texas, 1773-1779” (Ibid., IX, 
67-137), and “Spanish Activities on the Lower Trinity, 1746^-1771” (South¬ 
western Historical Quarterly, XVI, 339-377). Professor Bolton’s articles on 
various tribes of Texas Indians in Handbook of American Indians (published 
by the Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington) contain also a wealth of 
information on the Spanish period. Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapters I—VIII; 
Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, Chapters I—III.] 

Indirectly Spain began to accumulate information concerning Texas 
in 1519, when Alvarez de Pineda sailed the Gulf from Florida to 
Tampico. Ten years later (1528) several survivors of the Narvaez 
expedition were cast on the shore of Texas, and, after six years of 
wandering along the coast from Galveston to Corpus Christi, Cabeza 
de Vaca and four others escaped from the Indians who had enslaved 
them and made their way to Mexico. De Vaca wrote an account of 
their experiences, which gives us our earliest source for conditions 

3 


4 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

of the Texas interior. In 1540 members of the De Soto «P ed ^ 
after the death of their leader, entered East Tc ™ ^ 
on their way to Mexico and penetrated as far as the Brazos Riv 
before turning back. The same year Coronado s ex ^ dlt ' 0 "’^ rch ‘ 
ing for Quivira, traversed a considerable portion of West Texas. 

The interior of Texas continued to be penetrated by occasional 
parties of Spanish explorers for the next hundred and fifty years. 
Until well past the middle of the seventeenth century these parties 
advanced eastward from New Mexico, which the Spaniards had early 
occupied; but at the same time settlement was slowly pushing toward 
Texas through northern Mexico, and missionaries were already urging 
the occupation of the Tejas county when news reached the govern- 
ment that a French expedition was headed for the country. 

France had begun to occupy Canada at the beginning of the seven¬ 
teenth century. Fur traders and Jesuit missionaries moved rapidly 
westward, and in 1673 Louis Joliet and Father Marquette explored 
the Mississippi River from Wisconsin to Arkansas. Ten years later 
La Salle followed the Mississippi to its mouth, and then returned 
to France to beg permission from Louis XIV to settle a colony there. 
His plan was a strategic one. France already held the St. Lawrence, 
the Great Lakes, and the Upper Mississippi; and a colony at the 
mouth of the great river would go far toward securing the possession 
of the whole valley. Moreover, such a settlement could be made the 
basis of operations against Mexico, in case France and Spain became 
involved in war. The king approved, and La Salle was generously 
fitted out with colonists and supplies. 

The colonists included some farmers, artisans, and men of family, 
but too many of them were undesirable adventurers. In the West 
Indies one small vessel was captured by Spaniards, but the incident 
was not then reported to the government and therefore created no alarm 
in Spain. The remainder of the little fleet lost its bearings, and in 
February, 1685, entered Matagorda Bay and made a landing. A ves¬ 
sel was wrecked here—the Aimable, the supply ship—and many pro¬ 
visions and arms were lost. Beaujeu, the sailing master, returned 
to France in another ship, leaving La Salle one small vessel. This, 
too, was later wrecked. It soon became evident that the Mississippi 
did not enter Matagorda Bay, but La Salle could not believe that 
it was far away. A fort was built some miles inland on the Garcitas 
River, and a search for the Mississippi began. 

The Indians, malaria, and their own excesses soon brought the 
party to a desperate state. La Salle was stern, arbitrary, and un- 
sympathetic and incurred the hatred of some of the worst characters, 
who murdered him in 1687 near the present site of Navasota, 1 while 
he was making his third expedition in search of the Mississippi. After 

1 This approximate location of the murder of La Salle is derived from 
Professor H. E. Bolton, of the University of California. 



SPANISH TEXAS, 1528-1821 


5 


La Salle’s death the settlement rapidly went to pieces. Some of the 
party eventually reached the Mississippi and made their way to 
Canada and France; many died of disease or were massacred by the 
Indians. When the Spaniards arrived in search of them in 1689 
there were less than half a score of survivors scattered among the 
Indians. 

The Spanish authorities had learned during the fall of 1685 of 
La Salle’s plan for a settlement on the Gulf, and between 1686 and 
1689 five searching parties were sent by sea and four by land to find 
him. It was only the fourth of the land expeditions that succeeded. 
Captain Alonso de Leon commanded this expedition in 1689, and with 
him was Father Damian Massanet, a devoted Franciscan missionary. 
They found the French settlement (Fort St. Louis) in ruins. Several 
dead bodies lay unburied on the prairie. Clearly the danger of a 
French occupation for the present was over. 

Learning that four Frenchmen were living among the Tejas In¬ 
dians in East Texas, De Leon wrote to them inviting them to accom¬ 
pany him to Mexico. Two of them joined him, and with them came 
a chief of the Tejas. Missionaries and explorers had long been wish¬ 
ing to get in touch with these Indians, and Father Massanet exerted 
himself especially to win the friendship of this chief. He was suc¬ 
cessful, and parted from him with a promise to return the next year 
and establish a mission among the Tejas, the chief assuring him that 
the Spaniards would be welcome. 

Spurred by the fear of French encroachment, the viceroyal gov¬ 
ernment of Mexico approved the proposal of De Leon and Massa¬ 
net for the establishment of a settlement among the Tejas, and in 
the spring of 1690 De Leon led a second expedition to the country. 
Marching first to La Salle’s deserted settlement he destroyed it, so 
that it might not harbor other intruders, and then proceeded north¬ 
ward to the Tejas. On a small stream some ten miles west of the 
Neches and northeast of the present town of Crockett he built a 
rude log chapel and left three priests and three soldiers to win the 
region to Christianity and to Spain. A few months later the priests 
established a second mission (Santa Maria) on the Neches. At first 
the Tejas were peaceful and friendly, but pestilence and bad crops 
followed and they became ill-humored and troublesome. Next year 
priests and soldiers were reinforced from an expedition led by Gov¬ 
ernor Teran de los Rios, but in 1693 they abandoned Texas, and Spain 
made no further attempts to occupy the province until fear of the 
French again arose in 1716. 

In 1699 a French settlement was founded at Mobile Bay, and in 
1712 a French merchant, Antoine Crozat, received from the French 
government a monopoly of the trade of Louisiana, which was regarded 
as including all the territory drained by the Mississippi and its tribu¬ 
taries. But this field was too restricted for Crozat’s ambition. He 


6 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

wished also to trade with the Spaniards in northern and northwestern 
Mexico. In view of the exclusive commercial policy of Spain, th s 
could be done only by a system of smuggling with the connivance of 
the Spanish colonial authorities. A man of ability and address was 
needed to approach the Spanish officials, and Governor Cadillac of 
Louisiana selected Louis Juchereau de St. Denis, an experienced 
Indian trader and explorer. St. Denis led a party up Red River to 
the present site of Natchitoches, where he established headquarters 
for trade with the Hasinai or Tejas confederation of Indians in East 
Texas, and then pressed on across Texas to the Spanish presidio a 
short distance southeast of the present Eagle Pass. .In 1714 this post 
was commanded by Captain Diego Ramon. To him St. Denis un¬ 
folded his proposal for trade, but the captain referred the matter 
to the viceroy at Mexico and held St. Denis a prisoner. 

An interesting romance has woven itself around the young French¬ 
man’s sojourn here, but the thrilling details presented by Gayarre and 
Brown seem to have no other foundation than the fact that St. Denis 
later married Captain Ramon’s granddaughter. The viceroy was con¬ 
siderably alarmed by the French advances, and ordered St. Denis sent 
to the capital. 

As the result of personal conferences with St. Denis, the viceroy 
decided to reoccupy East Texas, a measure to which the missionaries 
had been urging him for years. St. Denis agreed to guide an expe¬ 
dition, and this, with priests, soldiers, and settlers, got under way in 
1716, commanded by Captain Domingo Ramon. The Spaniards were 
welcomed by the Tejas Indians, who had missed the small gifts with 
which the missionaries had been in the habit of cultivating their 
friendship; and during the next few years a group of missions was 
established around the present towns of Nacogdoches and San Au¬ 
gustine. In 1718 San Antonio was founded and became the important 
Spanish stronghold in this outlying frontier province. 

In the meantime, the French post at Natchitoches grew stronger 
and in 1719 compelled the Spaniards to flee to San Antonio for pro¬ 
tection. Two years later, however, the Marquis De Aguayo re¬ 
established the Spanish settlements and strengthened the presidios; 
and further relations between the French and Spanish on this fron¬ 
tier were marked by little friction. In 1762 Louis XV ceded Louisi¬ 
ana to Spam, and the international boundary moved eastward to the 
Mississippi, across which faced the aggressive English instead of the 
easy-going French. 

After the founding of San Antonio in 1718, Spanish governors 
and missionaries made energetic efforts to colonize Texas and civilize 
the Indians. Aguayo established a post near the site of La Salle’s 
hort St. Louis in 1721, which after being twice moved was finally 
fixed in 1749 at modern Goliad. The great mission buildings near 
San Antonio, which constitute one of the most impressive historical 


SPANISH TEXAS, 1528-1821 


7 


and architectural monuments of the Southwest, were constructed 
(1720-1730) ; and others of less pretentious character were scattered 
from Refugio and Liberty, near the coast, as far west as San Saba 
and Rockdale. 

Following the French cession of Louisiana, the settlements in East 
Texas were abandoned, but many of the settlers who had known no 
other home were ill at ease in San Antonio, whither they were moved, 
and in 1779 Gil Ibarbo led a number of them back and founded 
Nacogdoches on the site of the old mission of Our Lady of Guada¬ 
lupe. 

The permanent results of Spanish activities in Texas to the close 
of the eighteenth century were pitifully small, but it must be remem¬ 
bered in extenuation that the province was very remote and that the 
Indians were peculiarly untractable. When measured by the results 
later achieved by the United States with convenient bases and incom¬ 
parably greater resources, Spain’s failure to civilize the Indians 
affords little cause for criticism or surprise. 

On October 1, 1800, Spain receded to France “the Colony or 
Province of Louisiana with the same extent that it now has in the 
hands of Spain, and that it had when France possessed it.” On April 
30, 1803—as the treaty is dated—France sold Louisiana, with the 
same limits, to the United States. What were the boundaries of 
Louisiana thus vaguely described? Napoleon had instructed General 
Victor to take possession to the Rio Grande, and on that ground, 
chiefly, President Jefferson and other prominent statesmen were in¬ 
clined to claim Texas. But they were much more anxious to extend 
the eastern boundary over West Florida, a narrow strip along the 
coast from the Mississippi to the Perdido River, and expected to 
play the Texas claim against this coveted region. Historians are 
agreed that the claim to West Florida was baseless, but despite the 
accidental, temporary character of La Salle’s settlement and the de¬ 
liberate, permanent occupation of the province by Spain from 1716 
onward, the Texas question has not been so easily settled. In 1819 
the United States surrendered by treaty all claims west of the Sabine, 
but many patriotic citizens believed that the government exceeded its 
constitutional power in alienating territory to which its title was good. 
It was this belief that made possible the demand for the “re¬ 
annexation” of Texas in the national Democratic platform of 1844. 

Before the acquisition of Louisiana by the United States Anglo- 
Americans had already begun to penetrate Texas. For years Philip 
Nolan, a protege of General James Wilkinson, had been making occa¬ 
sional trips to San Antonio. In 1800 he led a small party into the 
province for the ostensible purpose of capturing wild horses. Whether 
that was his sole object is even yet not clear. Toward the end of 
March, 1801, he was overtaken by Spanish soldiers near the present 
city of Waco, and in the ensuing battle Nolan was killed. His men 


8 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

then surrendered, expecting to be sent home from Nacogdoches, but 
on the contrary they were marched to Mexico, where in the course 
of time all except Peter Ellis Bean elude the historical vision. Bean 
joined the revolutionists in 1810, and when Mexico gained its mde- 
pendence he was a colonel in the patriot army. During 1826-1835 
he was stationed at Nacogdoches as a sort of Indian agent. 

In 1812 Bernardo Gutierrez and Augustus Magee, lately a lieu¬ 
tenant in the United States army, invaded Texas with a considerable 
force of American adventurers, Spaniards, and Indians. They took 
Nacogdoches in August and Goliad in October. Here Magee died. 
In the spring of 1813 the invaders advanced on San Antonio, and, 
after defeating the Spanish governor in a terrible battle, entered the 
town on April 1. Gutierrez’s brutality to the prisoners alienated 
many of the Americans, who now abandoned him. The others were 
decoyed into an ambush by General Arredondo near the Medina River 
in June and badly defeated. 

The avowed object of Gutierrez and Magee was to win Texas 
for the revolutionary party in Mexico. They undoubtedly expected 
to turn success to their personal profit, but in just what way does 
not clearly appear. 

After the signature of the Florida treaty of 1819 by which the 
United States relinquished its claims to Texas, Dr. James Long of 
Natchez, Mississippi, led an expedition which for a brief time occu¬ 
pied Nacogdoches and proclaimed the independence of Texas. It 
is somewhat significant that Long, like Nolan, had a connection with 
General James Wilkinson of the United States army, his wife being 
Wilkinson’s niece. At the time of Long’s invasion the royalist power 
had almost succeeded in stamping out the revolution in Mexico, and 
Texas was well defended. Troops advanced from San Antonio, and 
catching Long’s forces in scattered detachments easily defeated and 
expelled them. Long took advantage of the renewed revolutionary 
wave in 1820 to return to Texas, but was no more successful than 
before. In fact, he was taken prisoner and sent to Mexico City, 
and there a short time later was killed by a Mexican soldier. 

In a sense Nolan, Magee, and Long, with the men whom they led, 
were but the advance couriers of American expansion. In the first 
twenty years of the nineteenth century the United States pushed its 
settled frontier westward to the Mississippi, and crossed that line in 
Louisiana, which became a state in 1812, and in Missouri, which was 
admitted in 1821. The natural line of advance to further expansion 
was toward the southwest. That the adventurous pioneers entered 
Texas in organized bands rather than as peaceful trappers and set¬ 
tlers was probably due to the revolutionary condition of New Spain 
from 1810 to 1821, which suggested the pretext of marching in force 
to the relief of the local patriots. These invasions served the pur¬ 
poses of spying out the country, and of paving the way for the peace- 


SPANISH TEXAS, 1528-1821 


9 


ful penetration of Moses and Stephen Austin and the “crowd of ex- 
presarios” who followed them. 

The opportune attainment of Mexican independence in 1821 un¬ 
doubtedly furthered the colonization of Texas from the United States 
by creating a temporary glow of friendship for the republicans of 
the North, who had gone through much the same experience with 
England as had the Mexicans with Spain, and whose liberal institutions 
the Mexicans dreamed of emulating. 


CHAPTER II 


LA SALLE’S SETTLEMENT AND THE FIRST SPANISH 
MISSION IN TEXAS 

By R. C. Clark 

[The selections which follow are from Clark’s “Beginnings of Texas,” 13, 
18-20, 23-25, 39-42. They describe briefly the La Salle settlement, near the 
shore of Matagorda Bay, the Spanish discovery of the ruined French settle¬ 
ment, and the establishment and abandonment of Mission San Francisco de los 
Tejas, 1690-1693. See Garrison, Texas, 1-33; H. H. Bancroft, North Mexican 
States and Texas, I, 373-406; Barker, Potts and Ramsdell, A School History 
of Texas, 1-21.] 


I. La Salle’s Settlement 

It would be inconsistent with the purpose and limitations of this 
paper to give more than the briefest outline of the voyage and sub¬ 
sequent adventures of La Salle. Having received his commission he 
went to work to enlist his company and equip the expedition. For 
the transportation of his people to the new world he secured four 
vessels: The Joli, a ship of the royal navy of thirty-six guns; a store- 
ship called the Aimable; the Belle, a frigate; and a ketch, the St. 
Francis. 

On the 24th of July, 1684, the ill-sorted company, consisting of 
two hundred and eighty people—seamen, soldiers, priests, artisans, 
women and children—embarked from the port of Rochelle; and eight 
months later, about the middle of February, 1685, after many hard¬ 
ships and misadventures, having missed the mouth of the Mississippi, 
it passed through the narrow channel between Matagorda Peninsula 
and Matagorda Island into the bay of Matagorda. 

It will be sufficient merely to indicate the events that followed— 
the landing upon the sandy shore of the bay, which the French called 
Bay St. Louis; the loss by criminal carelessness of the storeship 
Aimable with the provisions, arms and supplies that were on her; 
the departure of Beaujeu with those of the expedition who had be¬ 
come discouraged or dissatisfied; the settlement of the colony a few 
miles inland on the La Vaca River; 1 the sickness, accidents, and 

1 See Bolton, “The Location of La Salle’s Colony” for later information on 
this point— Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XXVII, 171-189; below, Chapter 

III. 


10 


LA SALLE’S SETTLEMENT 


11 


misfortunes by which the company of two hundred was soon reduced 
to a few score; and La Salle’s three painful efforts to pass overland 
to the Mississippi, ending with the tragedy of his murder by his own 
men. The fate of the unfortunate persons who were left at the 
village of St. Louis, as it touches the enterprises of the Spaniards, 
will appear as we proceed. . . . 

[Information of the fact that there was a French expedition in the Gulf 
headed for the mainland aroused the Spanish authorities in Mexico, and re¬ 
sulted in the sending out of five expeditions by sea and four by land to search 
for the French landing. How Captain Alonzo de Leon’s expedition found the 
ruined settlement in 1689 is told by the next extract.] 

Captain Leon resumed his march southward, and on April 22, 
[1689] reached the village and fort of St. Louis, near the La Vaca 
River. Ali there was deserted and silent. About the yard were scat¬ 
tered the contents of plundered houses: broken chests and boxes and 
barrels; the broken tackle of a ship; a great number of books with 
leaves torn and scattered, but bearing still the evidences of costly 
bindings; and broken cutlasses, and the stocks of many arquebuses 
with locks and barrels gone. On the prairie near by lay three dead 
bodies, one of which, from the fragment of a dress that still clung 
to it, appeared to be that of a woman. 

The village consisted of five or six small houses of palisades, 
plastered over with mud, and covered with the skins of buffaloes; a 
larger house, where apparently animals were kept, and a wooden fort, 
made from the timbers of a wrecked vessel. The fort had four lower 
rooms, one of which had served as a chapel, and above these rooms 
was an upper story which had been used for a storeroom. Scattered 
about the fort were several swivels and eight small guns of four 
or six pounds, some upon the floor and some upon their broken car¬ 
riages. Upon the casing of the principal door of the fort was in¬ 
scribed the year of its occupation, with other details of the history 
of the village. 

Before setting out upon the return journey Captain Leon de¬ 
scended to the coast and explored the bay of Espiritu Santo. Skirt¬ 
ing the shore for many leagues, he saw the shattered spars and broken 
timbers of a wrecked vessel. On his return to the fort he found that 
the Indian messenger had arrived, bringing a letter from the French¬ 
men. They asked the Spaniards to wait for them, saying that they 
would be on in a few days, that they were waiting for another French¬ 
man who was with some Indians farther away. 

While waiting for them Captain Leon with a party of twenty 
men set out to the east and discovered the Rio de San Marcos (Colo¬ 
rado), 1 which he explored almost to its mouth. He then returned to 

1 Really the Lavaca. See below, page 26. 


12 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

the place where his company had gone into camp and found that the 
Frenchmen still delayed to come; whereupon he determined to go 
with a few men in search of them, sending the rest of the company 
on to the Guadalupe to await his return. He accordingly set out with 
thirty men toward the country of the Tejas. After three days he re¬ 
joined his company upon the Guadalupe, bringing with him two of the 
Frenchmen; they were Juan Archbepe (Jean L’Acheveque), a young 
man from Bayonne and one of the murderers of La Salle, and 
Santiago Grollet, a sailor, who had deserted La Salle on one of his 
early journeys in search of the Mississippi. The other two French¬ 
men, Pedro Muni (Pierre Meusnier) and Pedro Talo (Pierre Talon), 
distrusting the Spaniards, preferred to remain with the Indians. 

From the captives the Spaniards learned more in detail the story 
of the destruction of the little colony in Fort St. Louis. Before the 
final catastrophe the smallpox had broken out among the villagers, 
reducing their number till there were scarcely more than a score left. 
La Salle had gone away with the ablest bodied of the men on a last 
toilsome journey in search of “the fatal river.” Day by day the few 
men, women and children left upon the shore of Bay St. Louis waited 
while hope slowly failed them. Around them was the unending 
wilderness, pathless and inhospitable; before them stretched a waste 
of sand, beyond which spread out the wide, tantalizing expanse of 
the sea. 

Near the first of February, in the year 1689, the end came. They 
had been on friendly terms with the Indians around them, and sus¬ 
pected no evil. The savages came and went about the village, bar¬ 
tering for trinkets and professing friendship. But underneath this 
amicable pretension was a hatred which had existed since La Salle, 
soon after landing, had taken from them their canoes; they were 
biding their time. One day five of them came to the village under 
the pretext of trading. They stopped at a house apart from the 
others and began to barter noisily. Soon all the people of the village, 
willing to accept any diversion to pass the tedious days, came out 
and gathered around the savages, watching curiously. Other Indians 
came and joined the boisterous colloquy. When all the white people 
of the village were in the house or near it, a band of warriors rushed 
up from the river, where they had lain concealed, set upon the vil¬ 
lagers, and killed them all except five, who were saved by the Indian 
women. 

The five who were thus saved, were the four children of the 
Canadian Talon, three boys and a girl; and a young man from Paris 
named Eustache Breman. The young Talons, before their rescue, 
had been compelled to see their mother killed before their eyes; their 
father had gone with La Salle on one of his early efforts to find the 
Mississippi and had never returned. After massacreing the villagers 
the Indians had plundered the huts and the fort, breaking open the 


LA SALLE’S SETTLEMENT 


13 


chests and scattering their contents, carrying away whatever they 
fancied, and breaking up what they could not use. . . . 

[Returning to Mexico, Captain De Leon and his chaplain, Father Damian 
Massanet, induced the viceroy to sanction a settlement among the Hasinai or 
Tejas Indians, in East Texas.] 

II. The First Spanish Mission in Texas 

On the 28th of March, 1690, the combined military and missionary 
expedition set out from the presidio of Coahuila. It was an indis¬ 
criminate company of tailors, shoemakers, carpenters, miners, and 
other persons of adventurous turn, and little suited to the arduous 
business of opening a new country or making permanent settlements. 
Crossing the Rio Grande they advanced northeast, following a course 
similar to that of the former journey. At the Guadalupe the main 
body of the army stopped, while Captain Leon with twenty men de¬ 
scended to the coast. 

They found no evidence that the fort had been occupied since they 
were there before, though there were many signs of the presence 
of Indians in the vicinity. Father Massanet declares that he him¬ 
self set fire to the dismantled fort, and as there was a high wind 
blowing in half an hour it was in ashes. Captain Leon and his party 
then went down to the bay and made a further examination of it, pass¬ 
ing all along its shores, and exploring also the river upon which the 
Frenchmen had built their village. . . . 

Captain Leon dispatched a messenger to the governor of the Tejas 
to announce the approach of the Spaniards, and in a short time he 
appeared with his attendants to welcome them. On the 22d of May 
the company arrived at the chief village of the Tejas, where they 
were entertained with much kindness at the house of the governor. 
As the savages still showed themselves willing to have missionaries 
remain among them, the friars, with the assistance of Captain Leon, 
set to work at once to select a site for their mission; and as soon 
as this was done, they began to cut and haul logs to build a chapel 
and a dwelling house for the priests. By the end of May the rude 
log church was finished, and on June 1 was consecrated with all 
solemnity. 

The mission of San Francisco de los Tejas was situated four or 
five leagues from the Neches river. It stood in the heart of a savage 
wilderness, four hundred miles from the nearest settlement. Near it 
flowed a small stream and around it was a pleasant forest. The three 
friars, Miguel Fontecuberta, Francisco de Jesus Maria, and Antonio 
Bordoy, with Fontecuberta as president, were left to carry on the 
missionary work. They set themselves at once to learn the language 
of the Indians, making a list of their words and phrases and using 
the young Frenchmen as interpreters. Only three soldiers were left 


14 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


to protect the mission, it being the opinion of Father Massanet that 
more would not be needed. 

[In June, 1690, the missionaries built a second mission on a stream which 
they called “Archangel San Miguel (probably the Neches).” The following 
summer the governor of Coahuila and Texas, Domingo Teran de los Rios, 
took supplies and reinforcements to the missions. The condition of the settle¬ 
ments and their subsequent history are told by the next extract.] 

Father Francisco, in his letter to the Count of Galve, sets forth 
some of the difficulties encountered during the year and three months 
in which he was chaplain of the missions among the Asinais. The 
many superstitions of the Indians, the adverse influence of their 
medicine men, the evil conduct of the soldiers who had been left to 
guard the missions, the difficult task of learning the many languages 
or dialects, rendered it impossible to accomplish much good. 

He wisely suggests that thereafter a strong garrison should be 
placed with each mission; that the soldiers who form these garrisons 
be married men; and that they bring with them their families, and 
thus constitute villages around the missions. He insists that in order 
to convert them the Spaniards must set them a good example. “And 
so I beg your Excellency,” he writes, “that you consider how this, 
as agreeable to the Lord, may not be lost by sending the criminals 
taken from the prisons, both unmarried and vagabonds, who, if they 
were turned loose among Christians, would do harm, and would here 
commit atrocities and prevent the ministers of the Lord, by their 
depraved life and bad example, from gathering the fruit of these 
souls.” 

In this pathetic appeal we are able to read the causes of the failure 
of these first missionary efforts, and to foresee the policy which the 
Spaniards were constrained later to adopt in their efforts to convert 
the savage tribes. 

Of the subsequent history of the missions San Francisco and 
Santa Maria little can be told in detail. As has been indicated 
already, the Indians began to give trouble before the departure of 
Teran’s company. A small guard of a corporal and ten soldiers was 
left to protect the friars, but it was altogether inadequate; and what 
little assistance the few soldiers might have rendered in preserving 
the missions from injury was precluded by their lack of discipline 
and self-restraint. So great, indeed, were the difficulties and dis¬ 
couragements, that six of the friars who had come out with Teran’s 
expedition refused to remain, and others, it seems, remained unwill¬ 
ingly. 

Massanet and the missionaries left with him continued their efforts 
at San Francisco and Santa Maria more than two years; but the 
work did not prosper. A general epidemic lasting from May to 
November, 1692, carried off a great number of the Indians and one 


LA SALLE’S SETTLEMENT 


15 


of the priests; the medicine men attributed the disease and death to 
the water used by the priests in baptism, and made the work of the 
missionaries difficult; the Indians proved intractable and it was im¬ 
possible to reduce them to pueblos; for two successive seasons the 
harvests were destroyed by flood and drouth; the missionaries lived 
in constant apprehension of a hostile outbreak among the Indians; 
the savages among whom they were laboring joined in with those 
from the coast country in carrying off the cattle and horses; the sol¬ 
diers conducted themselves in a boisterous manner, setting a bad 
example to the Indians whom they were seeking to convert and at 
the same time angering them by their treatment of their women. 

In June of 1693, Gregorio Salinas arrived from Coahuila with 
provisions and other necessaries for the missions; but his arrival 
had not the effect of encouraging the missionaries to persevere; on 
the contrary, several of them took advantage of the opportunity to 
return to Mexico. Massanet sent letters to the viceroy describing 
the condition of the missions, and setting forth their urgent needs. 
Three things are necessary, he urges, to secure the fruit of the mis¬ 
sions : there must be a sufficient number of soldiers to command 
the respect of the Indians; the missions should be founded in a 
place suitable for cultivation; and the Indians should be compelled 
to live in pueblos. 

The government, however, was not in a mood to do anything. 
There was no longer any urgent political reason for maintaining set¬ 
tlements beyond the Rio Grande and the reports from the missions 
showed that the difficulty of maintaining them would be very great. 
The alarm of a French occupation had passed, and there was a dis¬ 
position to postpone to some future time the occupation of the eastern 
lands. The report of Massanet, in which he described the difficulties 
of his situation as we have indicated was laid before a junta general 
on the 21 st of August, 1693, and that body determined that the mis¬ 
sionaries and soldiers should be ordered to retire and seek a more 
desirable spot in Coahuila for their missionary efforts. 

In the meantime the savages were daily becoming more threaten¬ 
ing. The padres heard of plots among them to drive them away or 
to kill them, and they constantly became more aggressive, continuing 
to carry off their cattle and horses. The principal chief of the Tejas"\ 
informed Father Massanet that the Indians were tired of the Span¬ 
iards and were determined to drive them from their land. This 
decided the missionaries to depart, and they did so on the night of the 
25th of October, taking away the [church] ornaments and burying the 
swivel guns, bells and other iron things. A little later, March, 1694, the 
viceroy formally ordered the abandonment of the province of Nueva 
Montana, and Texas was left for twenty years to the undisturbed 
possession of the Indian tribes, to wait until another and more serious 
menace to their authority in lands east of the Rio Grande should 


16 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


stimulate the rulers of New Spain to a saner and more determined 
effort to make good their title to that vast region by the fact of 
actual occupation. 

The question may well be raised here, by way of conclusion, 
whether these several unsuccessful efforts to establish missions among 
the Tejas and Cadodachos were of any permanent value in the evo¬ 
lution of Texas. Without doubt they were. A certain amount of 
substance and energy must always be wasted in forcing civilization 
V^into an unbroken wilderness. Each new country has its peculiar 
difficulties, which only experience can teach how to overcome. Paths 
must be traced, mountains and valleys traversed, boundaries searched 
out, and coasts and rivers explored; and these things are seldom 
accomplished without lavish expenditure of men and means. 

That remote inland settlements are difficult to establish, and 
more difficult to maintain; that the organization of an extensive sys¬ 
tem of missions must be the slow work of years, and not the accom¬ 
plishment of a summer campaign; that the conversion of even the 
most tractable of Indians must be a mingling of force with persua¬ 
sion; and finally, that the mission could thrive only when it existed 
side by side with the presidio—these were the useful deductions 
from Fray Damian Massanet’s costly experimenting. 

And there were other lessons of value. A more correct idea of 
the geography of Texas was obtained; the most important rivers 
were named and their courses determined; roads were marked out 
from Coahuila to the plains of Southwest Texas along which Spanish 
civilization could advance more surely; and the bay of Espiritu Santo 
became an easy and familiar landing place for later expeditions. All 
these facts were worth something when the time came at length to 
undertake seriously the task of opening the lands beyond the Rio 
Grande for settlement. 

These early missionary efforts, then, are not to be considered 
unimportant. The little log church of San Francisco and its com¬ 
panion mission by the Neches, although ephemeral and productive 
of no immediate good, in the larger outlook were eminently worth¬ 
while ; for they served as an admonition and a warning when, twenty 
years later, the friars came again to stretch their line of larger and 
more substantial churches from the Rio Grande to the Sabine. 


CHAPTER III 


THE LOCATION OF LA SALLE’S COLONY ON THE GULF 
OF MEXICO 

By Herbert E. Bolton 

[From The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XXVII, 171-189. For addi¬ 
tional reading on the same general subject, see Casis: “Discovery of the Bay 
of Espiritu Santo” (in Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, II, 
281-312; Dunn, “The Spanish Search for La Salle's Colony” (in The South¬ 
western Historical Quarterly, XIX, 323-370). Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapters 
I—III; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 5-10.] 

One of the unsettled points in the history of La Salle’s career 
in America has been the exact location of the colony which he estab¬ 
lished temporarily on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico in 1685. The 
view held by Parkman and most other writers has been that the 
site was on the Lavaca river, but from this opinion some have dis¬ 
sented, while others have been in doubt because of the inadequacy 
of the available data. The question is debatable no longer, for it is 
settled once for all by newly discovered records in the archives of 
Spain, which have been corroborated by archeological and topograph¬ 
ical investigation. 

In order to put this new evidence in its proper setting, it seems 
desirable to review briefly the main features of the well-known story 
of La Salle’s enterprise. In 1682 La Salle descended the Mississippi 
to its mouth and conceived the idea of founding there a colony in 
the name of the king of France. In writing of his purposes, his¬ 
torians generally have laid the chief emphasis upon La Salle’s desire 
to control and develop the valley of the Mississippi, and through that 
stream to establish connection with Canada. But La Salle had other 
purposes which were equally or even more prominent in his plans. 
French explorers in the interior of North America had long dreamed 
of finding a way to the much talked of mines of northern Mexico. 
France and Spain were continually at war or on the verge of war, 
and at the very time when La Salle descended the Mississippi French 
buccaneers were scouring the waters of the gulf and making raids 
upon the Spanish settlements of Florida. In the course of the next 
year French corsairs three times sacked the Spanish settlement of 
Apalache. Thus France and Spain were competing for the control 
of the northern shores of the Gulf of Mexico, and of this competition 
La Salle’s project was a part. When he returned to France, there- 

17 


18 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


fore, La Salle proposed to establish a colony on the gulf, not only 
as a means of controlling the Mississippi valley and the northern gulf 
shore, but also as a base of attack, in case of war, upon the Spanish 
treasure fleets and upon the northern provinces of Mexico. These 
purposes La Salle plainly set forth in his proposals to the king, and 
on these terms his plans were approved by Louis XIV. 

The colony of some four hundred people left France in the sum¬ 
mer of 1684, and in the autumn reached the West Indies, the ketch 
of St. Frangois having been captured by the Spaniards on the way. 
While in the West Indies La Salle was gravely ill, but he recovered 
his health and in November continued his voyage. For reasons which 
have never been fully explained, the mouth of the Mississippi was 
missed and a landing made near Pass Cavallo, on Matagorda bay. 
Some students have maintained that the passing of the Mississippi 
was not accidental, but designed by La Salle, in order better to attack 
the Spanish provinces of Mexico. This view, however, seems un¬ 
warranted. 

After reaching Matagorda bay the expedition went rapidly to 
pieces. A landing had scarcely been made when some of the colonists 
died from sickness and others were killed by the Indians. In the 
attempt to enter the bay, the Aimable was wrecked. Beaujeu, the 
naval commander, had quarreled with La Salle from the beginning, 
and from Pass Cavallo he sailed back to France with the Joli, carry¬ 
ing away some of the soldiers and a large quantity of much needed 
supplies. Tonty, La Salle’s lieutenant, by agreement descended the 
Mississippi to meet him at the mouth, but of course did not find him, 
and therefore gave him no aid. 

To make the best of a bad situation, La Salle moved his colony 
to a better site near the head of Lavaca bay and began a series of 
expeditions to the eastward in the hope of finding the Mississippi 
river, which he thought to be near. While engaged in exploring the 
eastern portion of Matagorda bay, the Belle, the last of La Salle’s 
four vessels, was wrecked and left stranded on the inner shoals of 
Matagorda peninsula. 

On his third expedition northeastward La Salle, with a few com¬ 
panions, made his way to the Cenis Indians on the Neches, and to 
the Nasoni north of Nacogdoches. But here he was forced by deser¬ 
tion and sickness to retrace his steps, and he returned to the settle¬ 
ment at Matagorda bay. 

The colony by this time had dwindled down to a mere handful, 
and succor was imperative or extermination certain. Again the 
intrepid explorer set forth with a few companions, in an attempt to 
leach Canada. Crossing the Colorado near Columbus, he made his 
way to the Brazos, which he passed just above the mouth of the 
Navasota. Here a quarrel arose among his followers, in the course 
of which Moranget, La Salle’s nephew, was slain by his companions 


THE LOCATION OF LA SALLE’S COLONY 


19 


while hunting for supplies which La Salle had cached in the vicinity 
during the previous expedition. 

To save their own necks, when La Salle reached the scene of 
the murder the conspirators slew him as they had slain Moranget. 
Historians have supposed that this act was committed near the Trinity 
or the Neches, but evidence now available makes it quite clear that 
the spot was between the Brazos and Navasota rivers, and near the 
present city of Navasota. . . . 

From the Navasota river the survivors of La Salle’s party con¬ 
tinued eastward to the Cenis and Nasoni. Here some deserted, but 
others, including Joutel and La Salle’s brother, Abbe Jean Cavelier, 
made their way across the Red river to the mouth of the Arkansas, 
to Tonty’s post on the Illinois, and to Canada. From Tonty they 
concealed the news of the tragedy which had occurred in the wilds 
of Texas, but he learned the truth through Indians, and in the fall 
of 1689 made a second voyage down the Mississippi in an effort to 
rescue the colonists. Crossing Louisiana to the Natchitoches, he 
ascended the Red river to the Caddo, and then made his way south¬ 
west for eighty leagues to the Nouaydiche, a village of Indians 
living near the Neches. But here, for lack of aid and guides, and, 
it is said, hearing of the approach of De Leon, he was forced to 
give up the search. Accordingly, he purchased horses from the 
Indians and returned to Canada. 

Meanwhile the little colony on the gulf dwindled down to a 
mere handful. Many of the people died of smallpox. Finally, early 
in the year 1689, four years after the colony had landed, most of 
the survivors were slain by their savage neighbors, the Karankawa 
Indians. In the course of the next few years five children and four 
men were picked up in various parts of Texas by Spaniards, taken 
to Mexico, imprisoned, or otherwise disposed of. Just a quarter 
of a century later two of the boys, Jean and Robert Talon, reap¬ 
peared in Texas as guides of the famous St. Denis, when in 1714 
he made his historic journey from Natchitoches to the Rio Grande. 

Such in outline is the story of La Salle’s unfortunate colony. 
Much of what we know of it is learned through the records of Span¬ 
ish expeditions sent out in search of it. News of La Salle’s voyage 
to the Mississippi was acquired through the capture of a French 
corsair off the coast of Yucatan in September, 1684. Soon Spanish 
parties were sent forth by land and sea to find and eject the intruders. 
In 1687 the wrecks of the Aimable and the Belle were seen by mem¬ 
bers of two of these expeditions, who took from them four pieces 
of artillery “and three painted fleurs-de-lis.” They concluded that 
the French colony had been completely destroyed; but, to make 
certain, overland expeditions were sent out from Monterey and 
Monclova, then the principal outposts on the northeastern frontier 
of New Spain. 


20 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


The leader of these expeditions was Alonso de Leon, the ablest 
frontiersman of his district. In 1686 and again in 1687 he made 
his way to the Rio Grande and explored it to its mouth, looking for 
the French. Hearing in 1688 of a strange white man dwelling among 
the Indians north of the Rio Grande, he crossed it near Eagle Pass 
and found a lone Frenchman ruling single-handed a large confed¬ 
eracy of savages. The Frenchman was captured by strategem and 
taken to Mexico; in 1689 he returned as guide to De Leon, now on 
his fourth expedition in search of La Salle’s colony. 

Making his way to the northern shores of Lavaca bay, De Leon 
found the ruins of the French settlement, rescued from the Indians 
a few survivors, held a conference with an Indian chief from the 
Neches river, and returned to Mexico. Next year he was sent on 
a fifth expedition, instructed to destroy the French fort and to aid 
Father Massanet in founding missions on the Neches, where it was 
feared the French might reappear, and where the friars had long 
dreamed of establishing the faith. The French fort was burned, and 
the bay was again visited. 

In the summer of 1690 De Leon returned to Monclova and re¬ 
ported what he had done. Among other things he stated that in 
the bay, a short distance from the mouth of the stream on which 
the French colony had been established, he had seen two buoys which 
were not there the year before and could hardly have been placed 
there by the Indians. So serious was the matter regarded that a 
council of war was held in Mexico to consider it, for it was feared 
that the buoys might mark the entrance to some channel in which 
other French vessels were lurking, or to which they might return. It 
was resolved, therefore, that they should be destroyed; the method 
of their destruction was left to be determined by the viceroy. 

The viceroy not only desired to learn who had left the buoys, 
and to protect the bay, but was even more concerned to establish a 
water route to the missions which had been established on the Neches. 
In September, therefore, he sent out an expedition to investigate these 
points. A ship was equipped for three months, provided with a 
launch and a canoe, manned with sixty soldiers and sailors, and put 
in charge of Captain Francisco de Llanos, an officer in the West 
Indian fleet. With him went Gregorio de Salinas, who had been 
with De Leon on his last expedition, and who was now put in charge 
of the land operations. As pilot the viceroy appointed Juan de 
Triana, an expert in the navigation of the gulf. As master of the 
fortification and mapmaker went Manuel Joseph de Cardenas y 
Magana, who had shown skill in the building of the great prison 
fortress of San Juan de Ulua, still standing near Vera Cruz. . . . 

The Llanos expedition seems hitherto to have been unknown to 
historians, and yet its records are of first importance in determining 
the plans of the viceroy regarding Texas, and, incidentally, in fixing 


THE LOCATION OF LA SALLE’S COLONY 


21 


the location of La Salle’s colony. The records comprise correspond¬ 
ence, a diary, and a carefully made map of Matagorda bay and its 
tributaries. The map is so accurate that we are able to identify 
practically every point which Llanos, Salinas, and Cardenas visited; 
and there can be no question as to its reliability. It is the work of 
a skilled and careful engineer. 



Descripcion exacta del Lago de S. Bernardo y del Todos Santos que 
nuevamente se hallo este ano de 1690. 

Map made in 1690, containing the essential data on the Cardenas Map 
but with different Lettering. (Drawn from a photograph.) 

On October 24, Llanos and his party reached Pass Cavallo. . . . 
On the twenty-seventh the party crossed the bar. On the twenty-eighth 
they reached the spot where the Ainiable had gone down (F). Turning 
northwest, on the thirtieth they reached Sand Point, which was accu¬ 
rately mapped and described. On November 1 they entered Lavaca 
bay in the launch, and named it Todos Santos (All Saints) in honor 
of the day. Proceeding to the northwestern corner of Lavaca bay, 



22 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


they reached the place where the buoys had been reported (2). They 
proved to be only logs of driftwood. 

Continuing northward, Llanos and his party entered the mouth 
of the river flowing into the bay at its northwestern angle, obviously 
the Garcitas. This stream was given the name of Rio de los Fran¬ 
ceses, or river of the French. The words of the diary are interesting 
here. It says: “We continued up the river until we arrived at a little 
village of Indians whom we did not understand and who did not 
understand us. From here we continued up the river till we saw 
some houses, on the highest elevation. Proceeding toward them, 
we landed on the banks and discovered that they were the settlement 
and fort of M. de la Salle [Munsuir de Salas], from many signs 
which we found there, such as wheels of cannon carriages, musket 
breeches, and many burned planks and beams of the fort.” De Leon 
had burned the fortification a few months before. Another report 
tells us that the French settlement was two leagues or about five 
miles up the river. At night Cardenas and his party returned to the 
vessel near Sand Point. Before morning a storm arose which pre¬ 
vented any work of exploration on the following day. 

On the fourth the party went north again in the launch and entered 
the bay where Port Lavaca now stands. From there they went to the 
inlet now called Chocolate bay, and explored it with the canoe. Car¬ 
denas guessed that it might be the mouth of the Medina river, which 
had been crossed by De Leon in the interior; but he was careful 
to state that this was only a guess. 

Next day they continued up the west coast to the mouth of Placedo 
creek, which they ascended for a league in the canoe, thinking it 
might be the Guadalupe river. Returning they examined again the 
two logs of driftwood, and for a second time entered the Garcitas 
river. Says the diary: “We found the place where the artillery of 
the fort was said to be, and we uncovered it in order to see it and 
satisfy ourselves. We saw that it was of iron. Then we passed 
on, and, following up the said river, we camped for the night at 
point P.” (x on map published.) This point was some three or 
more miles above the fort, and not far from the present residence 
of Mr. Claude Keeran. Next day they continued up the river till the 
water was too shallow for the launch, but evidently they did not reach 
the mouth of Arenosa creek, for no mention is made of such a stream. 
Descending, they spent the night in the bay near the mouth of the 
river of the French. 

At another point the diary gives further data regarding this 
stream and the French settlement. It says: “The width of the river 
is sixty yards at the entry. It is eighteen or twenty palms deep, 
but at places decreases to eight palms, at some of the fords. Its whole 
bottom is of mud; after three leagues up it contains some groves of 
oaks, liveoaks, and some wild grapes and willows. 


THE LOCATION OF LA SALLE’S COLONY 


23 


“As to the site [of the French settlement], it is on the highest 
point of the plain. It overlooks two-thirds of it in the direction of 
the river, and one-third is a level extending indefinitely northwest. 
As to the materials, the land is black, rich, and sticky. The river 
is of fresh water; the timber, of which there is some, is a little distant. 
There are no stones even to supply needs.” 

Next day the party raised the drift logs, cut off some pieces, and 
loaded them on the launch to take to the ship and to Vera Cruz. Con¬ 
tinuing their exploration, they crossed the head of Lavaca bay to 
another river, coming in at the northeastern angle of the bay. Ascend¬ 
ing this stream next day for some five or six miles, they camped for 
the night (at the point marked 3 on the map). Next day they passed 
a village of Indians, and shortly afterward the mouth of the river 
coming from the northwest (4), which they recognized as the one 
that De Leon had called the San Marcos. It was obviously the Lavaca. 
Ascending the east fork (the Navidad), which on his map Cardenas 
called Rio del Espiritu Santo, they rowed a few miles, but were 
stopped by a raft of drift logs. The river was described as being 
well timbered, which was not true of the river of the French. 

Turning about they camped some two miles above the junction on 
an elevation (6) described as a red bluff, admirably adapted to forti¬ 
fication and settlement. This spot was clearly the place where the 
village of Red Bluff now stands. 

Next day, the ninth, they descended the river, and explored the 
small bay or lagoon above the delta (2). On the tenth they explored 
Cox’s bay, next below (8), and on the eleventh Keller’s bay (9). 
From here they returned to the western shore of Lavaca bay, where 
they camped opposite Sand Point (below T and N). 

“There,” says the diary, “we found the place where M. de la Salle 
[Munsuir de Sales] had made the barracks to lodge his men and all 
the rest of his train, in order thence to conduct them to his settlement. 
It is inferred, therefore, that his vessels did not go beyond this point 
—there being insufficient water—whence he conducted all that he had 
in launches and canoes.” 

On the twelfth the party began the exploration of the main bay, 
to the east. Coursing along the north shore, they passed the mouth 
of Carancahua bay (11) and camped some distance east of it under 
the shelter of a red cliff and a gunshot from a spring of fresh water. 
This place, which was apparently near Well Point, can perhaps be 
identified by residents of the locality. Next day they continued east¬ 
ward to Trespalacios bay, returned, rounded Half-moon Point and 
proceeded east. 

On the fifteenth they entered a small inlet, and then continued 
east to a lagoon (15, 16) at the mouth of a large river which formed 
a delta. This stream was clearly the Colorado. Cardenas called it 
the Trinidad, no doubt thinking it was the stream bearing that name 


24 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


which De Leon had crossed in the interior. On the sixteenth they 
ascended the eastern mouth of the river some ten or fifteen miles 
to a point (18) near Beadle, and returned by the westernmost channel 
till stopped by a raft of drift logs, whence they turned back, descend¬ 
ing by another channel. Continuing eastward up Matagorda bay for 
a short distance on the seventeenth, they then turned back, coasting 
Matagorda peninsula, looking for an outlet to the gulf, and crossed 
to the west side of the bay, where they camped near Point Connor (25). 

With this camp as a base, several days were spent in exploring 
and sounding the channel. While here a soldier died and his body 
was thrown into the bay. Finally, on the twenty-ninth, they crossed 
the bar into the gulf, and set sail for Vera Cruz, which they reached 
on the ninth of December, after an absence of fifty-nine days. 

Anyone who will take the trouble to compare a modern map with 
that made by Cardenas will be struck by the accuracy of the latter, 
and will be filled with admiration for the engineer’s skill. . . . 

The bearing of the Cardenas report and map upon the location 
of La Salle’s colony is obvious. They simply settle the matter once 
for all and without argument. The settlement was on the Garcitas 
river and not on the Lavaca, as has been supposed. This I realized 
as soon as I studied the map, as must everyone conversant with the 
conditions of the problem. But I had the curiosity to see the locality, 
to test more minutely the work of Cardenas, and, although the proof 
in no way depended upon this confirmation, to see if perchance the 
site of the colony was still marked by archeological remains and 
was known to local tradition. 

Accordingly, on July 3, 1914, I left Austin for the Garcitas river. 
Going next day from San Antonio by the Southern Pacific railroad, 
and passing on the way gatherings of people participating in barbecues 
and other holiday activities, about 1 p. m. I stopped at Placedo station, 
having before me the prospect of taking the midnight train to Ben 
West, some fifteen miles east on the Brownsville road, and on the 
Garcitas river there to wait for daylight and the assistance of the 
local inhabitants. But a little inquiry at Placedo made it clear to me that 
the place which I was seeking was on Keeran ranch, and that I must 
see Mr. Claude Keeran, owner of the ranch and a lifelong resident 
of the place. I made bold, therefore, to call him up by telephone, 
introduce myself, and tell him of my errand. He was interested at 
once, and generously volunteered to co-operate. At his suggestion 
I rode out seven miles that night in a wagon with Mr. Vickers, who 
was boring a well on the Keeran ranch, spending the night in the 
camp as Mr. Vickers guest. Next morning as we were eating break¬ 
fast, Mr. Keeran, accompanied by his foreman, Mr. Charles Webb, 
came in his automobile, and together we spent the forenoon going 
over ar enas ground, with copies of his map and the accompanying 
report in hand. 


THE LOCATION OF LA SALLE’S COLONY 


25 


Conversation at Placedo with Mr. J. S. Webb, who for years 
had ridden the Keeran ranch, had elicited the fact that on a bank 
overlooking the Garcitas river were ruins known in the neighborhood 
tradition as “The Old Mission,” but otherwise unexplained. Mr. 
Keeran confirmed this report, took me to the spot, and informed me 
that, like most “old sites” in the Southwest, it had long been an object 
of attention to treasure seekers. It is exactly where Cardenas’ map\ 
shows La Salle’s settlement, on the west bank of the Garcitas river, 
about five miles above its mouth, and on the highest point of the 
cliff-like bank of that stream. The place is between Malden Mott 
and Letts’s Mott, but considerably nearer the former than the latter. 
The spot is the vantage point of all the country round. To the south, 
west, and northwest, stretch indefinitely the great level prairies, now 
sprinkled with a recent growth of mesquite, but in La Salle’s day 
an open prairie dotted with buffalo herds. In front lies a beautiful 
little valley through which winds the Garcitas river, a good sized 
stream, from a hundred to a hundred and fifty feet in width, and still 
navigable with a launch for a number of miles above its mouth. 
On the other side the valley is hemmed in by a range of low hills 
which, off to the northwest, fade away into the great plain lying 
east of Victoria. The choice by La Salle of the spot for his colony 
is no cause for surprise. A careful comparison of the topography of 
the valley with Cardenas’ map and description showed that he had 
delineated correctly every important bend in the stream, and had even 
placed on his map west of the river and below the French fort the 
small lagoon now known as Red Fish lake. 

The archeological remains of the settlement, so far as we ascer¬ 
tained, are not extensive, but they are palpable and of certain char¬ 
acter. Before we went to the site Mr. Keeran stated that years ago 
there were distinct remains of an ancient wall, but feared they had 
entirely disappeared. But he was mistaken in this, for we easily 
found the wall, then just visible above the surface of the ground, and 
without any digging were able to trace it for many feet. The wall 
is made of large, red, adobe-like blocks, apparently of baked red 
clay. Subsequently, Mr. Keeran has found it to be two and a half 
feet thick and to inclose an area ninety feet square. 1 From the 
surface of the ground I gathered a handful of small fragments of 
antique blue and white porcelain. The story of the finding of the 
“vases,” which made its way into the daily press, is a pure fiction 
of the reporter, for which I am in no way responsible. Mr. Keeran 
told me, with full circumstantial details, of the unearthing on the 
spot, some thirty years ago, of half of an immense copper kettle, 
nearly a yard in diameter. It was exhumed at dead of night by a 
party of treasure hunters, who were working under the direction of 

J Letter from Mr. C. A. Keeran, August 26, 1914. He writes me that in addi¬ 
tion he found a carving fork, crockery, pottery, a bullet, spikes, and a coal pit. 


26 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


a fortune teller and were frightened away by uncanny sounds. Mr. 
Keeran states that the kettle remained neglected on the site for several 
years and then disappeared. . . . 

One of the tests of a scientific hypothesis is whether it is contra¬ 
dicted by or harmonizes with individual phenomena. As might be 
expected, the substitution of truth for error on this fundamental point 
of the location of La Salle’s fort dispels several other difficulties which 
have arisen regarding early expeditions in Texas. The San Marcos 
river described by De Leon as from three to six leagues east of “The 
River of the French,” has been taken by students to be the Colorado, 
a stream which in fact is a good fifty miles away. The San Marcos 
referred to was obviously the Lavaavas shown on Cardenas’ map. 
Starting with the Lavaca as the site of the French fort, Joutel’s report 
of La Salle’s last expedition to the eastward raises difficulties regard¬ 
ing the streams at every part of his journey. But with a correct start 
his itinerary is easy to follow. Starting too far east, students have 
come out too far east in locating the place where La Salle was 
murdered, placing it on the Neches or the Trinity, instead of on 
the Brazos. 

One point further remains to be dealt with, lest misunderstand¬ 
ings creep in. For two or three years after the destruction of La 
Salle’s colony its site was frequently visited and was temporarily 
occupied by the Spaniards, as a base of operations in the interior of 
Texas. Later on, in 1722, it became the site of what was intended 
to be a permanent Spanish settlement. A fort was built by Aguayo 
square on the site of the one which had been erected by La Salle. 
We are sure of this, because in digging the trenches Aguayo’s men 
unearthed numerous remains of the French establishment. The Span¬ 
ish fort was given the name of Nuestra Senora de Loreto. Across 
the river was established the mission of Espiritu Santo. Four years 
later the fort and mission were moved northwest to Mission Valley, 
near the present Victoria, and in 1749 were transferred to the San 
Antonio river, to become the nucleus of the present city of Goliad. 
Thus, the relics on the banks of the Garcitas mark the site of both 
La Salle’s colony and the Spanish presidio of Loreto. The walls still 
visible are probably the remains of the Spanish rather than the 
French fortification. 

University of California, 

Berkeley. 


CHAPTER IV 


THE SPANISH OCCUPATION OF EAST TEXAS 

By R. C. Clark 

[In 1714 the French trader, Saint Denis, established a settlement at Natchi¬ 
toches, on Red River, and then crossed Texas to the Rio Grande in the hope 
of arranging a trading connection with the Spanish settlements in northern 
Mexico. The westward movement of the French and Saint Denis’s proposal 
alarmed the Viceroy of Mexico and he ordered an expedition to march from 
Coahuila to East Texas and establish settlements there to serve as a barrier 
against the farther westward march of the French. 

The selection which follows is from Clark’s “Beginnings of Texas,” 61-69. 
See Garrison, Texas, 26-85; H. H. Bancroft, North Mexican States and Texas, 
I, 602-635; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 21-46; 
Bolton, “Native Tribes about the East Texas Missions,” in Quarterly of Texas 
State Historical Association, XI, 249-276, and “The Spanish Abandonment and 
Reoccupation of East Texas, 1773 - 1779 /' i n Ibid., IX, 67-136; Shelby, “St. 
Denis’ Declaration Concerning Texas in 1717” and “St. Denis’ Second Expe¬ 
dition to the Rio Grande, 1716-1719,” in Southwestern Historical Quarterly, 
XXVI, 165-183, XXVII, 190-216.] 

The similarity between the advance movement [of 1716 ], as out¬ 
lined in the plan of the council of war, and those of 1690 and 1691, 
is evident at once. In this instance, as in the former ones, fear of 
French encroachment furnished the incentive. Now, as then, a small 
body of soldiers was sent forth with a few friars to establish missions 
among the Tejas Indians, and to keep watch on the French; and 
now, as then, these establishments were to be far from any base of 
supplies, unconnected by any line of forts or settlements with the 
frontier presidios [forts] of Mexico, and dependent for existence on 
the good will of the natives. 

The disastrous ending of their former missionary efforts had 
taught the Spaniards little. The emergency was greater than in 1690 
or 1691, but the energy put forth to meet it was less. ... In 1690 
the French offered no real menace to Spanish interests. . . . But 
by 1715 a different state of affairs existed. The French were estab¬ 
lished at the mouth of the Mississippi. For several years they had 
been sending their traders westward to explore the country and traffic 
with the Indians, and were beginning to feel and to assert a para¬ 
mount title to the lands discovered by La Salle. They stood upon the 
very threshold of Spanish territory, and were threatening at any 
moment to enter and take possession. 

With their rivals thus established, active, energetic and aggressive, 

27 


28 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the Spaniards could not, as in the former instance, allow their mis¬ 
sionary and colonizing enthusiasm to expend itself in a single ephem¬ 
eral effort. They must follow up the first expedition with others. 
They must found not four missions, but as many as would be needed 
to secure them in possession of the country. Each mission must have, 
not two soldiers, but as large a garrison as was necessary to protect 
it from the savages and from the advancing French. They must secure 
and fortify a port on the Texas coast. They must be at all times 
active and vigilant. In this constant and growing necessity for watch¬ 
fulness and activity on the part of the Spaniards of Mexico lay the 
best promise of a permanent occupation of Texas. 

Moreover, the missionary program of 1715 differed in one sig¬ 
nificant respect from those of 1690 dnd 1691. If the Spanish had 
not brought many lessons out of the costly experimenting of Father 
Massanet, they had learned one of considerable value. The failure 
of the first missions among the Tejas had been due largely to the 
evil conduct of the soldiers. Unmarried men, and adventurers merely, 
they had been little disposed to settle down soberly and industriously 
to the routine of mission life, and instead of aiding the friars in their 
noble work, hindered them rather by their vicious lives. 

To prevent a recurrence of this evil it was determined, in the 
later movement, to send with the priests, as far as possible, only men 
of family, who would be more circumspect in their conduct, and 
who would go with the expectation of making homes for themselves 
in the new country. With wives and mothers in the company, and 
actual settlers equipped with agricultural implements—plows and hoes 
—and oxen, the expedition began to look, in a degree at least, like 
a sane attempt to occupy and colonize the eastern wilderness. 

On the 30th of September the viceroy, the Duque de Linares, 
appointed Domingo Ramon captain of the soldiers and leader of the 
expedition. Saint Denis must have made a favorable impression on 
the Spaniards, for he was offered a place in the company of Captain 
Ramon which he accepted, receiving the title of cabo camboyador 
(chief guide), at a salary of five hundred dollars a year. 

If an answer was made to his proposition to open up trade in 
cattle, nothing of it appears in the record, and we can not be sure 
that he went so far as to broach the subject of a general commercial 
treaty. Apparently, in entering the services of Mexico he gave up 
the original object of his journey. It is possible, however, that he 
was merely shifting from one expedient to another. The traffic 
in horses and cattle was to have been only an introduction to a larger 
trade. If he could accomplish his purpose more easily and directly 
by employing other means, he was willing to alter his plans 
accordingly. 

The establishment of the missions would bring the Spaniards 
nearer to the French, and would furnish a more convenient market 


THE SPANISH OCCUPATION OF EAST TEXAS 29 


for his goods. Moreover, by assisting in founding the missions he 
might reasonably hope to gain the friendship of the Spanish, and thus 
render it easier to carry out his plans of trade. The right of the 
French to the vast territory of Texas he seems to have been willing 
to waive, if thereby he might better his own material fortunes and 
those of his patron. 

The defection of Saint Denis to the service of the Spanish was 
no doubt influenced to an extent also by an affaire de coeur [love 
affair] in which he became involved soon after his arrival upon the 
Rio Grande. While he was at the presidio of San Juan he fell 
in love with the granddaughter of the commander. The attachment 
was mutual, and nothing but the necessity that Saint Denis was under 
of proceeding to the City of Mexico prevented a speedy consumma¬ 
tion of their desires. As soon, therefore, as he could come to an 
understanding with the high officers of the government he returned 
to the presidio to celebrate his marriage with Dona Maria, and to 
await there the coming of Captain Ramon and his company. 

He had time to enjoy but a few weeks of conjugal felicity. Feb¬ 
ruary 17, 1716, Captain Ramon set out from the Villa de Saltillo, 
leaving behind six soldiers as an escort for the friars who were to 
come later. On the 3d of March the padres overtook the company 
and they all proceeded northward toward the presidio of the Rio 
Grande, halting at several villas and missions along the way. As a 
result of the bad financial policy of paying in advance, six of the 
soldiers deserted before they came to the river, taking with them 
their horses and the money they had received. Supplies of all kinds, 
such as goats, meal, corn, etc., were collected along the road. At the 
Mission de la Punta, Padre Hidalgo and three other friars joined 
the party. 

They arrived April 18 at the presidio of the Rio Grande, where 
Diego Ramon, the father of Captain Domingo Ramon, was in com¬ 
mand. Here they halted for a day to collect more provisions. The 
20th was consumed in putting across the river more than a thousand 
head of cattle and goats. They were delayed at the Rio Grande 
until the 27th, waiting for the friars, who had been detained by the 
illness of Fray Antonio Margil de Jesus, chief of the Zacatecas friars. 
Here Isidoro Felix de Espinosa, president of the missions around 
San Juan, joined the company as director of the Queretaro friars. 

Captain Ramon, while they were in camp at the river, made a 
list of all the persons in his company. The religious party consisted 
of five friars, one lay brother, and one lay friar, besides Espinosa 
and Hidalgo already mentioned. Captain Ramon, his son, and Lieu¬ 
tenant Diego (grandson of the elder Diego Ramon), and twenty-two 
soldiers formed the military escort. Of these soldiers five were mar¬ 
ried, and one married en route. The Frenchmen in the party were 
Saint Denis, Jalot, and one other. In addition to the military and 


30 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


religious contingents there were two men with their families and thir¬ 
teen unmarried men, who were going out apparently as prospective 
settlers and traders. These, with seven married women, one girl, two 
children, a negro and five Indians, constituted the company, which 
counted a total of sixty-five persons. 

On the 27th of April, Father Margil being still unable to travel, 
the company set out from the Rio Grande. Saint Denis, acting as 
guide, led the way over the northern and more direct route, after¬ 
wards known as the Old Presidio Road. 

The details of the journey need not detain us. On the 5th of 
May they halted to celebrate the marriage of Lorenzo Mercado, a 
soldier, and Anna Guerra. They capped on the 14th of the same 
month at some springs, to which they gave the name of San Pedro. 
These springs were at the source of the San Antonio river. Captain 
Ramon noted the spot as one most suitable for the building of a 
city, and Father Espinosa sees in it a suitable one for a mission. 

They found the Colorado swollen by recent rains, and crossed it 
with difficulty, after ascending some four leagues. Beyond the Colo¬ 
rado they found buffaloes in abundance, and from them easily pro¬ 
vided meat to supply the entire company. After they had crossed 
the Brazos, which they called the San Xavier, they found the Indians 
becoming more numerous, for they were approaching the country of 
the Tejas. Everywhere the natives manifested great joy when they 
learned that the Spaniards were returning to live among them. 

Captain Ramon, in his Derrotero [journal of the march], has 
much to say of the beauty of the country. The Guadalupe river, 
he thinks, more beautiful than can be imagined. There were lakes 
filled with fishes; game of all kinds in abundance; streams bordered 
with umbrageous trees; vines in profusion, loaded with half-ripe 
grapes; pastures with grass so luxuriant that the horses could hardly 
be made to travel through it; valleys flanked with cedars, willows, 
sycamores, live oaks, walnuts and lofty pines; and fields of water¬ 
melons and maize, from which the Indians, in token of their friend¬ 
ship, brought ripe melons and young corn. 

Saint Denis made himself useful to Captain Ramon as an inter¬ 
preter, and his great influence with the Indians was helpful in secur¬ 
ing for the Spaniards a kindly reception. He went on in advance 
of the company to the Tejas tribes, where, according to the plan, 
the first mission should be established, and gave notice of the approach 
of the Spaniards, returning soon at the head of a mounted delegation 
of chiefs. Captain Ramon received them with proper ceremony, the 
flaunting of banners and the firing of guns, and when they had all 
smoked the pipe of peace the Indians led the way to their village. 
On the way thither they met a larger body of natives, who came 
to meet them, bearing gifts of maize, watermelons and tamales, which 
they heaped together in a pile before the Spaniards. 


THE SPANISH OCCUPATION OF EAST TEXAS 31 


Captain Ramon, with reciprocal courtesy, ordered cloth, dishes, 
hats and tobacco to be distributed among the Indians. Then by means 
of an interpreter he addressed them, telling them that the Spaniards 
had come to look after the welfare of their souls, and to bring them 
to a knoweldge of the Holy Law and to a recognition of the author¬ 
ity of King Felipe V, who, by the hands of the Duque de Linares, 
viceroy of New Spain, had sent them these gifts as a token of his 
love. He instructed them, also, for the good of the government 
of their people, to select from their number one who should be their 
captain general. 

The Indians thereupon withdrew to confer together, and in a short 
time sent forward the youngest of their great chiefs as the one whose 
rule they could the most easily endure. To him were given the 
bast on and Captain Ramon’s own jacket as insignia of his rank and 
office. 

When these courtesies and ceremonies were finished the journey 
was resumed. On June 20 they came to the spot where the first 
mission of San Francisco de los Tejas had been established by Father 
Massanet in 1690. Captain Ramon, the friars, and some of the Indian 
chiefs set out to find a site for the new mission. They selected a 
spot four leagues farther inland than the original mission, because 
it was the choice of the Indians themselves. On the 3d of July the 
new mission of San Francisco was established upon the site selected, 
in the village of the Nacoches, the chief of three tribes for whom 
this mission was to be the religious center. Father Hidalgo, the only 
representative of the friars who more than twenty-five years before 
had worked among the Tejas, was placed in charge of the mission. 

Other missions were soon afterward established. The second, 
Purisima Concepcion, was placed at the pueblo of the Asinais, nine 
leagues northeast from the first; and the third, Nuestra Senora de 
Guadalupe, was nine leagues southeast from Concepcion, in the vil¬ 
lage of the Nacogdoches. These three missions stood on the road by 
which the French had made their incursions into Texas and were 
thus intended to guard against further trespass. A fourth, called 
San Joseph, was established among the Noaches, seven leagues north¬ 
east of Concepcion. 

Later, when the Spaniards discovered the presence of the French 
on Red River, they built two other missions still farther east and 
southeast, among the Adays and Ays. The one among the Adays, 
founded in the spring of 1717, and called San Miguel de Linares, 
was only eight leagues from the French post at the Nachitoches. The 
one among the Ays was called Nuestra Senora de los Dolores. 

In all this work of building churches and dwelling houses for the 
religiosos Captain Ramon found the Indians very diligent and skillful 
and pleased to give assistance. 

Concepcion was nominated the capital of the missions founded 


32 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


and to be founded by the Zacatecas friars, with Fray Antonio Margil 
de Jesus as president. Of the six missions already mentioned, three, 
namely, Concepcion, San Miguel de Linares, and Nuestra Senora 
de Guadalupe, were placed in his charge. Of the other three, and 
of all others that should be established by the Queretaro friars, Fray 
Isidore Felix de Espinosa was made president. It was agreed between 
the two presidents that each religious fraternity should draw its con¬ 
verts from the tribes in its own immediate territory, that there might 
be no conflict. 

An Indian captain general was chosen by the community of 
Indians for each mission, and his election approved by Captain 
Ramon. In like manner a governor and an alcalde were chosen for 
each pueblo; a treasurer was appointed from the friars at each 
mission, and a garrison was left for the protection of each 
establishment. 

Thus a sort of polity was created under Spanish control. The 
motive was not more religious than political. Here were six mis¬ 
sionary settlements planted in the heart of the Indian country. They 
were widely separated, and each stood in the center of a populous 
tribe. Thus the Spaniards endeavored to occupy and control as 
much territory as possible. They could not, of course, expect with 
a few scattered and feeble garrisons to resist a determined advance 
of the French; but they could, from their several posts, maintain a 
watch upon their enemies, and keep the home government informed 
of their movements. And in the meantime the work of converting 
the natives to the Christian religion and the Spanish allegiance could 
go on. 

Within reach of the missions were some four or five thousand 
Indians. To convert these, and to discipline them so that they might 
be effectively employed in the event of a conflict with their rivals, was 
the task the Spanish priests and soldiers set themselves to accomplish. 

The significant facts may be briefly summarized by way of conclu¬ 
sion. The Saint Denis expedition, from the viewpoint of the French, 
was a business enterprise growing out of the commercial policy of 
Antoine Crozat and his agent, Cadillac; it was in no sense military 
or political, but sought merely to secure for the French of Louisiana 
a freer and more profitable trade arrangement with Mexico. 

The same business motive no doubt led Saint Denis, when he 
failed in his first effort, to accept service with the Spanish and to 
assist to introduce their friars and soldiers into territory which might, 
with much justice, have been claimed as French. The missionary 
and colonizing expedition of 1716 was the immediate result of the 
presence of Saint Denis and his companions in Mexico; the rulers of 
New Spain were again brought to fear that the French would super¬ 
sede them in the lands east of the Rio Grande. 

Both in its plan and purpose, as well as in the motive which occa- 


THE SPANISH OCCUPATION OF EAST TEXAS 33 


sioned it, the entrada [expedition] of Captain Ramon resembled those 
of Leon and Teran, respectively, in 1690 and 1691. But there were 
two notable differences. The presence of women in the company, 
and of men equipped for active settlement, gave it the aspect of a 
permanent colonizing enterprise. The elements which in the earlier 
effort at settlement had offended and irritated the Indians were at 
this time, to a great extent, absent; and instead of being jealous and 
hostile, the natives were constantly friendly, and willing to assist the 
Spaniards in whatever way they were required. 

But the most important difference lay in the changed attitude of 
the French. Instead of an abandoned fort and a few refugees scat¬ 
tered among the Indian tribes, Captain Ramon found the rivals of 
Spain settled upon Red River, and facing aggressively westward. To 
have withdrawn again would have meant surely to abandon Texas to 
the French. 

Moreover, to make permanent the missions established among 
the Tejas tribes it was necessary to go further, to extend the sphere 
of occupation, and to make a greater show of strength. To this end 
a mission and a presidio were soon to be established upon the San 
Antonio River, a half-way house between the remote settlements on 
the Neches and Sabine, and the outlying settlements of Mexico; to 
facilitate communication by sea with the home government, a post 
was to be established on San Bernard Bay; and in order that they 
might better control the Indians and repel the advance of the French, 
the garrisons of the several missions were increased to an effective 
force. This time there was to be no retreat. 


CHAPTER V 


A DESCRIPTION OF MISSION LIFE 

Translated by Mattie Austin Hatcher 

[Spanish frontier settlements were usually made up of three units— a mission, 
a fort or presidio, and a town (pueblo or villa ) of civilian inhabitants. 

The selections which follow are translated from the manuscript report of 
an inspection made in 1 727. Read: Garrison, Texas, 53~66; Barker, Potts, and 
Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 29-38.] 

I. Mission San Antonio de Valero 1 

On October 15 of this present year, 1727, Fray Miguel Sevillano 
de Paredes, visiting commissary of the missions included in this presi¬ 
dency of Rio Grande del Norte, under a commission from our very 
reverend father, Fray Fernando Alonzo de Gonzalez, retired rector 
and censor for the Holy Tribunal of the Inquisition for the whole 
of New Spain, concluded the inspection of Mission San Antonio de 
Valero, including the missionaries as well as the buildings and other 
temporal possessions of the said mission. He found them all abso¬ 
lutely according to the inventories. 

The inspection was made in execution of the order of our very 
reverend father, the commissary general, in which His Reverence 
called for a statement of the number of converts in each mission, 
of its farming implements and livestock, of the crops that are gathered 
each year, and of the spiritual and temporal developments. 

Because His Reverence demanded everything requisite for the 
exact account which must be submitted to the very Reverend Father 
and be examined and inspected with the greatest care and fidelity, he 
ordered the books for the administration of the holy sacraments and 
those containing lists of the Indians to be brought before him. 

After having made an inspection of everything mentioned above 
—with the inventories before him—he ordered that a new 
check be made so that he might be sure about them and thus give a 
true and accurate statement concerning them. This was required in 
the case of all the missions. This having been done, he found the 
mission in the following condition: 

1 The Alamo was the chapel of this mission. 


34 


A DESCRIPTION OF MISSION LIFE 


35 


Indians in the Mission. —This mission, San Antonio de Valero, 
has seventy families, composed of three nations—namely, Xarames, 
Payayas, and Yerebipianos. These seventy families contain 273 
Indians of both sexes. Of these 273 Indians, only 164 are faithful 
Christians. The other 109 out of the 273 are unconverted. They 
are being catechised and are quite contented among the faithful Chris¬ 
tians. There were many more Indians but 127 of the adults who 
were baptized and prepared for this sacrament have died, as well 
as 30 baptized children. All of this is shown by the books of admin¬ 
istration and by the lists of the Indians. Besides the Indians named 
above, there have been many more but they have run away into 
the woods. The reason for their flight will be given in the report 
which will be made of the mission of Nuestra Senora de los Dolores 
de la Punta. 

Nations Adjacent to the Mission. —The Indian nations adjacent to 
Mission San Antonio de Valero are the following: 

The nation of Las Sanas, which, according to the examination that 
has been made, consists of 200 Indians, more or less; the nation of 
los Magayes, which must also have about 200 Indians; and Rancheria 
Grande, which is made up of various nations. The Indians at Ran¬ 
cheria Grande are not all heathens. There are many Christians there, 
those who have fled from the missions having gone to that rancheria. 
Rancheria Grande is beyond the Trinity near a place called Navasi. 
The Sanas nation is beyond the two rivers called Los Brazos de Dios. 
Los Magayes are at present located with the nation of Las Sanas. 

Requirements for Catechism and Education. —The requirements 
touching catechising and educating the Indians as well as adminis¬ 
tering the holy sacraments, both to the Indians as well as to the 
Spaniards, will be given consideration when the conditions at Mission 
La Punta are reported. The same practice is followed at all the 
missions. 

Farming Equipment at the Missions. —This mission, San Antonio, 
has 21 yoke of oxen, 24 plows, 61 large hoes, 34 hatchets, 12 iron 
shovels, 5 hoes, 8 crowbars, and 12 scythes. It has a forge for mend¬ 
ing this equipment as well as the necessary tools, yokes, whips, and 
straps for the yokes. 

Cattle. —This mission has upwards of 307 head of branded cattle 
and 132 unbranded calves, a total of 439 head. 

Sheep. —This mission has 272 head of goats, 210 head of sheep, 
and 70 head of young goats and lambs, making in all 542 head. 

Draft Animals. —This mission has 11 horses, 12 mules, and 22 
burros. The mission has a registered brand for branding the live 
stock. 

Annual Crops Harvested. —As regards the crops gathered each 
year, a definite statement cannot be given, because the crops vary 
according to the season each year. It can only be said that on an 


36 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


average Mission San Antonio de Valero harvests joo bushels of 
corn and little or no beans and other vegetables. This is the case 
at present. The reason for this scarcity is the great number of mice 
and insects which destroy everything as soon as it comes up. The 
use made of the corn will be discussed in connection with the last 
mission, Nuestra Senora de los Dolores de la Punta. 

Progress of the Missions In Temporal Matters .—This mission was 
first founded in the immediate vicinity of Mission San Juan Bautista 
and Mission San Bernardo del Rio Grande, under the name of San 
Francisco Solano. The Indians deserted that place on account of 
the lack of water. A mission was founded for these deserters in 
another place about 15 leagues from the Rio Grande, under the name 
San Ildefonso. 

In this place there were but few Indians. . . . They begged that 
another mission be founded. It was located three miles from San 
Bernardo, where a pueblo called San Jose was established for them. 
In that place they had but little water. . . . The missionaries made 
a report to his excellency, the viceroy, Duque de Arion y Marques 
de Valero. 

Upon seeing the report of the missionaries, the Marques de Valero 
issued orders and instructions for a mission to be placed on the San 
Antonio River. The order of the viceroy was carried out. A new 
mission was established under the protection of ten soldiers which 
his excellency ordered stationed there. In these moves much of 
what the mission had for its use was lost. This last mission was 
established with only five Indians. This was ten years ago. 

Afterwards an attempt was made to gather in the Indians of the 
Xarame nation. They had left Mission San Jose and had scattered 
about in the woods in the vicinity of the San Antonio River. After 
the Xaranamis were all gathered in, they sought and invited others 
to come in; to-wit, the nations of the Payayas and Yerebipiamos, 
mentioned above. These, with other nations—such as the Muruabes 
and Paguaches—have since come in. All of these—both the living 
and the dead—go to make up the number mentioned above. 

The pueblo was located about two gunshots from where it now 
is. The missionaries lived in a little fortified tower and in huts up 
until the year 1724, when a furious hurricane came and destroyed 
all the huts and did a great deal of damage to everything. The mis¬ 
sion was therefore moved to a better site, where it now is. 

Three good-sized cells and a granary have been built. Another 
cell is being constructed of stone and adobe and a convent is thus 
being started. Other substantial huts have been constructed for 
sleeping quarters and for other necessary purposes. The rancheria 
where the Indians live has also been built. 

Between 1724 and the present time an irrigating ditch has been 


A DESCRIPTION OF MISSION LIFE 


37 


dug from the river and opened so as to distribute the water over the 
cultivated fields. This ditch is about one league distant from the mis¬ 
sion. It took four years to bring the water to the land, for all of 
the work of digging had to be done with crowbars in the presence 
of and at the request of the missionaries. Especially was this true 
of Father Fray Jose Gonzalez, who was the one who labored hardest 
at this work for he realized that irrigation for the fields was the 
essential thing, or better said, the foundation without which there 
could be no mission. 

A stone church has not yet been built, but the materials for it 
have been collected for starting it. By the time this report reaches 
our very Reverend Father commissary general it will already have 
been begun. 

The building now used for a church is a hut. However it is large, 
neat, and clean, has a good door, and is very comfortable. The work 
will continue without loss of time until the pueblo, built entirely of 
flat-roofed houses, is finished. The mission, thanks to God, is being 
improved from year to year, as far as temporal things are concerned, 
due to the continued interest of the missionaries. 

Upon the development of the temporal welfare depends the con¬ 
tinued presence and obedience of the Indians. Upon this the spiritual 
edifice is founded. Without this temporal improvement the most 
important thing in the mission—the church—could not have been 
founded. It has already been pointed out that it has been three years 
since the pueblo was founded at this site—a better location than 
the one where it was before, two gunshots distant. 

This time [the three years] and even more has been spent in con¬ 
structing the ditch—a necessary thing in order that the Indians might 
plant their crops. So it was not possible to gather materials for the 
church while they were engaged in this task. Besides it may be 
pointed out that this location is near the Apaches and it is found that 
they come to the mission. As a matter of fact they have hindered 
the work on the irrigation ditch. 

As soon as it was possible work was started on the adobe and stone 
living quarters in order that the missionaries might be protected from 
the attacks of the wild Apaches, and because it has always been the 
intention to build the church entirely of stone, substantially and sym¬ 
metrically. It has been necessary to gather suitable materials and to 
secure a master workman who understands the business. It has been 
impossible to get such a workman, because masons are afraid to come 
to these dangerous regions, although efforts have been made to get 
them. It has not been easy to get materials for building; but little 
by little they have been brought together until there is now enough 
assembled to begin with. This is the substance of the replies of the 
missionaries when I interrogated them. 


38 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Account of the Spiritual Progress. —This mission has everything 
necessary for public worship, both sacred vessels and ornaments for 
the mass as well as everything proper for the administration of the 
holy sacraments—as is evident from the inventories. Everything is 
clean, neat, and orderly, as has been noted. The Christian doctrine 
is taught daily, each morning. In the afternoon the fundamentals of 
the doctrine of Father Ripalda are explained in the simplest terms 
possible on account of the ignorance of the Indians and their lack of 
understanding. . . . 

Efforts have been made to induce the Sanas nation to abandon 
their barbarous ways of living and to unite with our Holy Roman 
Catholic Mother Church; but it has not been possible to induce this 
nation or others to come in. The reason for our not being able to 
congregate them and the reason for the flight of many Indians, both 
neophytes and catechumens, and for the fugitives staying in the 
woods, I will give in the report concerning the last mission [La Punta]. 

Many of the baptized Indians confess and receive the sacraments 
even oftener than the annual obligations in the matter require. They 
come to hear mass not only on feast days but most of them hear it 
on market days. Of these, some do so from their own volition and 
others are induced to do so by gentle persuasion. The holy sacraments 
are administered to all the Christian Indians. The sick and dying 
are especially cared for in spiritual matters and in the matter of 
supplying their bodily needs. 

Effort is made to clothe all the Indians, the goods they use being 
secured for them from the alms which His Majesty, the King supplies 
for the support of the missionaries. Concerning this I will have 
more to say later. 

The spiritual needs of the soldiers and the citizens of the presidio 
are met absolutely without charge. This is well known to all and 
it has always been the custom. 

This is the report of Mission San Antonio de Valero and it is 
true, correct, and in legal form, the visiting commissary having assisted 
in inspecting and examining everything. Because it is true, he signs 
it, before me the present secretary, on October 16, 1727. 

Fray Miguel Sevillano de Paredes, Visiting Commissary. 

Before me, 

Fray Francisco Bustamante, Secretary of the Inspection. 

II. Mission Nuestra Senora de los Dolores de la Punta 

On November n, 1727, Father Fray Miguel Sevillano de Paredes, 
visiting commissary of the missions of this district of Rio Grande* 
made an examination of this mission of Nuestra Senora de los Dolores 
de la Punta where there are twelve families of two nations—to wit, 
the Pitas and the Pajalves. These twelve families contain fifty per- 


A DESCRIPTION OF MISSION LIFE 


39 


sons of the two sexes. All these individuals are Christians, having 
been baptized at the mission. This mission really has [under its juris¬ 
diction] forty families, of whom nineteen or twenty are Christians, 
the rest being unconverted; but they are all runaways and are fugi¬ 
tives in the woods. Of them I will speak later. Two hundred and 
sixty-nine baptized persons are known to have died in this mission. 
Of these two hundred and five were adults and quite ready for the 
sacrament. Sixty-four were children. A greater number have died, 
both of adults and children; but, when the Tabosos attacked this 
mission, which occurred in the month of September, 1714, the records 
as well as other things were lost, so that the necessary information 
on this point is now lacking. 

Nations Near This Mission. —The nations in the vicinity of Mis¬ 
sion La Punta are the following: 

The Pauzanes, which has about a hundred Indians. This nation 
is about forty leagues from this mission, on the other side of the Rio 
Grande to the eastward and lower down. 

The Pacoa nation. This is a large nation, containing more than 
three hundred Indians. They are located to the northward about 
thirty leagues from this mission. 

The rest of the Indians are wild Indians of different nations. 
There must be about four hundred of the two nations mentioned. 
With the rest of the nations just named, there must be not less than 
eight hundred Indians. 

Equipment of the Mission. —This mission has twelve yoke of oxen, 
fifteen plows, twenty grubbing hoes, twenty axes, two crowbars, one 
shovel, six hoes, and the necessary number of quirts. 

Cattle. —The mission has eighty-six head of branded cattle and, 
in addition, twenty-seven yearlings ready for the next branding, mak¬ 
ing in all one hundred and thirteen head. 

Sheep and Goats. —Mission La Punta has ninety head of sheep 
and five hundred and seventy goats on the range. There are two 
hundred kids and young lambs. These with the stock on the range 
amount to eight hundred and seventy head. These are the common 
property of the mission. Besides this nine hundred head of goats 
have been distributed among the Indians who are known by experi¬ 
ence to be dependable. These with the eight hundred and sixty belong¬ 
ing to the mission herd amount to nine hundred and fifty head of 
sheep and goats. 

Other Stock of the Mission. —This mission has eleven gentle horses, 
six mares, three mules, and two burros. It has a registered brand for 
branding the stock. It had more stock but the hostile Indians carried 
away thirty-three head on May 3 of this year. 

Crops Gathered Each Year. —Crop statistics can not be given 
exactly for this mission. There is more reason for vagueness in this 
mission than in others, because to the uncertainties of the seasons 




40 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

must be added the fickleness of the Indians in their work and in their 
permanence. For this reason little or nothing is gathered in some 
years. Sometimes the weather is not favorable; and when it is favor¬ 
able, little is gathered because the Indians run away and there are 
no hands to work the lands. Thus some years five hundred bushels 
are gathered, in others six hundred, others two hundred, and in others 
one hundred and ten, as was the case last year. Of the other products, 
such as beans, cotton, chili pepper, and other things there has been 
little or nothing gathered on account of the unreliability of the Indians 
and other conditions that will be mentioned. This year, during the 
month of September, about seventy bushels of corn were gathered 
to supply the Indians who are here. At the usual time for gathering 
the crops it is expected that more than five hundred bushels will be 
gathered since the patches are good. 

Progress of the Mission in Temporal Matters. —This was the first 
mission founded by the College of Santa Cruz de Queretaro, being 
established in the year 1698, on November 12th. So the mission has 
been founded full twenty-nine years. During this time a fine church, 
a well-lighted altar, and a good baptistry have been built. A convent 
with a cloister in which there are three cells and an office has been 
constructed. . . . The pueblo has been built. It contains six flat- 
roofed houses, four adobe huts, and the rancherias. There is a granary 
for storing the grain. The pueblo has a number of little orchards 
belonging to certain Indians who live permanently in the mission. 
It has an irrigating ditch running from the hill nearby. It has tilled 
\ ground within the mission property. During these years the small 
number of stock given as alms have increased to the number men¬ 
tioned above. The mission has a sufficient number of corrals to pen 
the stock. The mission has been greatly hindered by the unreliability 
of the Indians. 

Progress of the Mission in Spiritual Things. —Mission la Punta 
has everything necessary for Divine worship, sacred vessels as well 
as ornaments for the celebration of the mass. It has everything requi¬ 
site for the administration of the holy sacraments, as is evidenced by 
the inventories. The number of Indians named above have been bap¬ 
tized, those who are living as well as those who have died. The 
Christian doctrine is taught them every morning and in the afternoon 
they are taught the text of the catechism of Father Ripalda with the 
clearness and in the language that is suited to the limited understand¬ 
ing of these Indians, for they are the wildest in this district. Their 
ignorance results from their frequent flights into the woods, so that 
the missionaries are not able to instruct them in Christian doctrine 
and in civilized customs. The few Indians who are faithful know 
the Christian doctrine very well. A great number of Indians have 
been brought to this mission but they return to the woods and come 
back to the mission when they feel like it and when it suits them, 


A DESCRIPTION OF MISSION LIFE 


41 


because there are no means of holding them. The holy sacraments 
are administered regularly to all. This is the report of this mission 
Nuestra Senora de los Dolores de la Punta . . . November 5, 1727. 

Fray Miguel Sevillano de Paredes, Visiting Commissary. 
Fray Francisco de Bustamante, Secretary of the Inspection. 


CHAPTER VI 


TEXAS IN 1819-1820 

Translated by Mattie Austin Hatcher 

[The two selections which follow describe Texas on the eve of Anglo- 
American colonization. The first is an official report by a military officer, Juan 
Antonio Padilla, dated December 27, 1819. The second was prepared a year 
later by the ayuntamiento of San Antonio for the use of the Texan delegate 
to the Spanish Cortes. They are from The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, 
XXIII, 47-68.] 

I. Report on the Barbarous Indians of the Province of Texas 

By Juan Antonio Padilla 

A. DESCRIPTION OF THE PROVINCE OF TEXAS 

The Province of Texas, whose inhabitants are the barbarians and 
wild beasts, with the exception of the people of Sn. Antonio de Bexar 
and the Presidio of Bahia del Espiritu Santo [Goliad], the only settle¬ 
ments of Spaniards and they are but small, is a spacious and extensive 
territory. It has many rivers to water it. The principal ones are 
the Guadalupe, Colorado, Brazos de Dios, Trinidad, and Neches with 
the Sabine. They are famous for their volume of water and length, 
along the course of which they receive a great number of rivers, 
arroyos, and springs. All these rivers empty into the Gulf of Mexico 
at different points; and, although there are no ports, so-called, navi¬ 
gation and use, aided by industry, would make them so in fact. 

The land is extremely fertile, covered with all kinds of trees, 
especially from the Colorado river to the coast and the frontier of 
Natchitoches. There are immense forests of oaks, pines, cedars, and 
cypress of great size along the plains, for the mountain regions are 
unknown. It produces, in great abundance, all kinds of cultivated 
and wild plants, roses, and aromatic and medicinal plants, like the 
cisperina and others. In the woods of Nacogdoches, there is a tree 
from whose sap is secured sugar as good as that from the cane. On 
the banks of the Sabine there are chestnuts, pinenuts, and other fruits. 
Medlar-trees are common and nuts are abundant. Near Bexar, they 
gather apricots of as good flavor as those under cultivation. In all 
the rivers, arroyos, and springs there are abundant quantities of fish 
and other products of different kinds. Fine pearls are found in some 

42 


TEXAS IN 1819-1820 


43 


of them, and in all of them there are the greatest commodities and 
advantages for the establishment of haciendas, and pueblos of great 
importance. Toward the north, on the Colorado river there are min¬ 
erals known to the Indians but not worked. Cattle, horses, mules, 
irrigable and non-irrigable lands are afforded to the admiration of all 
who have seen them, but all under the domination of the barbarians. 
To the north of Bexar, and for a considerable distance, the climate 
is very healthful because of the altitude of the country and the purity 
of the air. Toward the coast and frontier of Natchitoches it is sub¬ 
ject to chills because the country is so low, so covered with vegetation 
—some of its being marshy—rainy at all times and especially during 
the rainy seasons. 

On the San Antonio river at Bexar there are four missions which 
the priests of the college at Zacatecas had held. They are Purisima 
Concepcion, San Jose, San Juan Capistrano, and San Francisco de 
Espada. 

That of Concepcion, distant one league from Bexar, has a church 
of hewn stone carefully constructed with arches, although it is in 
a bad condition because of damage by time. It has deteriorated con¬ 
siderably because of the absence of the priests and natives. The build¬ 
ings of the convent and the other offices are in the worst condition. 
Of other buildings, there remain only heaps of rubbish. This mission 
has a large irrigating ditch, although not in use now. With it they 
irrigated a considerable piece of land from which they gathered crops 
of all kinds. For three years some citizens of Bexar have been plant¬ 
ing these fields, but without irrigation since their poverty will not 
permit the expense of rebuilding the dam and cleaning the ditch. But, 
because that land is so rich, they have not lost their labor. 

The mission of San Jose is one league from Concepcion. It has 
a chapel which is well built of hewn stone although it is damaged by 
time through lack of repair. It owns rich ornaments, sacred vases, 
and much silver set with jewels and ornaments. All these show its 
former splendor and riches. The convent has a portion which is 
threatened with ruin. As for the rest, some [arches] have fallen down 
and others are poorly repaired by certain inhabitants settled there. . . . 
It has a large irrigating ditch and a considerable quantity of farming 
land which is cultivated with great success by these citizens. In this 
mission there is no lack of priests, for it has usually been the residence 
of the president of all the missions. 

The mission of San Juan is a league from that of San Jose. Many 
settlers have lived in it for many years. The church is unfinished, 
although it has a chapel in which mass is said. Its buildings are almost 
demolished, and the best of them are in poor repair. It has an irrigat¬ 
ing ditch and farm lands of which the settlers avail themselves. 

At an equal distance is the mission of San Francisco de la Espada, 
settled by a small number of persons, as in the former cases. Its 


44 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


buildings are in a similar state. Although it is eleven years since 
the death of Father Pedro Noreno, the last priest it had, the water 
for irrigation is still abundant and the farm land considerable in 
quantity and rich in quality. 

These four missions are in a state of decadence for lack of repair 
of the buildings. Each of them, at small cost, would support a settle¬ 
ment of Spaniards if the lands, water, and ruined buildings were 
divided among those who would voluntarily present themselves as the 
first settlers. None of them have any Indian settlers, the principal 
object of their establishment. If there are any, they are but few in 
number and changed into casts by mixture with the settlers of 
Bexar. . . . 

From the settlement of these missions, there would follow the 
advantage of increasing the population of that deserted province. The 
troops would have better means for securing the supply of things they 
use, and the settlers would secure advancement. They would aid 
each other mutually in their work for the preservation of the missions 
and in the defense against the barbarians. 

B. THE BARBAROUS INDIANS OF THE PROVINCE OF TEXAS 

These Indians, who are scattered over the immense territory lying 
between the 27th and 45th degrees north latitude and from the shores 
of the Gulf of Mexico to the Province of New Mexico, are known 
by different names. In obedience to superior orders, I describe their 
customs, habits, and modes of life, giving a concise statement of 
each one of the best known tribes, to whom is given the title of 
nations; and, for greater clearness, I will divide them into friendly 
and hostile groups. 

Friendly Nations 

The friendly nations are the Cado, or Cadodachos, Yuganis, Nacog- 
dochitos, Aizes, Vidaizes, Alibamo, Conchate, Chato, Chata, Orcoqui- 
sac, Nacazil, Cocos, San Pedro, Texas, Quichas, and Nadacos. 

Cado 

In this tribe, there is a leader or chief called a Gran Cado , whom 
nearly all the friendly nations recognize as a superior. This office is 
usually hereditary. . . . 

Considering the fact that they are heathens, the moral customs 
of these natives are good, since they are not ambitious like the Coman- 
ches nor deceitful like the Lipanes. They live by farming and hunt¬ 
ing. From the former industry they obtain large quantities of corn, 
beans, potatoes, and other vegetables which are sufficient for their 
families; and from the latter they obtain a large supply of furs from 
the bear, the deer, the beaver, the otter, and other animals. These 


TEXAS IN 1819-1820 


45 


they carry to Natchitoches and exchange for carbines, munitions, 
merchandise, tobacco, and firewater, of which they are very fond. 
Their houses are of straw, some are of wood, but all are well built. 
They enjoy social intercourse, dislike theft, and treat Spaniards well, 
entertaining them in their houses and aiding them in every possible 
manner. 

They are faithful in keeping their contracts; for the merchants 
of Natchitoches advance them munitions, trifles, and liquors at a 
good rate of exchange for furs. For all these they pay punctually, 
in spite of the fact that there are among them foreigners who come 
from Natchitoches and other points of the United States for the 
purpose of trading their wares to the said Indians for their products. 
Still, there are some swindlers and scoundrels who do not pay the 
debts they contract. 

Their language, like that of all barbarians, consists of a small num¬ 
ber of words. They use signs and gestures with the spoken word. 
The dialect is difficult and almost identical with that of nearly all 
the friendly nations—they themselves alone know how to distinguish 
the different dialects. 

Their knowledge is reduced to a small number of ideas so that 
they can barely judge of the present; and, although they remember 
the past, they scarcely ever provide for the future for the purpose 
of bettering their situation and of becoming more civilized. But due 
to their continuous trade with foreigners, it seems that they should 
not be called absolutely barbarous or savages. 

They, of all the Indians, perhaps, are the most civilized. They 
have no recognized religion, and it may be said that they are idolaters 
on account of the superstitions they make use of individually and at 
their dances and festivities. They have an idea of God, and confess 
him to be the author of all creation. But their errors, resulting from 
these false ideas inherited from their ancestors, are many. Only 
the light of the gospel, spread by the holy zeal of the priests dedicated 
to this benevolent work can destroy their errors. 

They marry by contract with ridiculous ceremonies. When a 
man’s wife dies, he marries again. They have a knowledge of many 
medicinal herbs which they use for wounds and other accidents with 
good results; although, in their method of cures, there is always pres¬ 
ent superstition and excesses. At their dances, they drink great quan¬ 
tities of firewater—some of them drinking until they tumble over. 
In these gatherings, there are never lacking some disorders resulting 
in personal injuries because of their drunkenness. They raise hogs, 
chickens, and dogs, and have horses and mules to make their journeys 
and hunting trips. 

This tribe is composed of about two thousand persons of all classes 
and sexes. Because of the commerce they have with foreigners, many 
of them have learned the French language, and a few the Spanish, 


46 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


poorly pronounced. They pierce their noses and wear pendant silver 
ornaments of different kinds. They shave a part of their heads with 
razors, and paint their faces with vermilion and charcoal. They live 
in the neighborhood of the Spanish Lagoon, a very large, navigable 
lake connected with the Colorado river of Natchitoches, and extend¬ 
ing almost to Vallupier, a settlement of Frenchmen, located on a 
small arroyo of this name, but which is subject to Spain. At the 
present time they are in the Neutral Ground. 

Yuganis 

The Yuganis, who live to the east of Nacogdoches, on the Neches 
river, at a distance of about thirty leagues, have the same customs 
and inclinations as the Cado. They differ from them in being a little 
darker and in shaving their beards in streaks with lancets, using 
charcoal. It is a small tribe not exceeding 150 persons. They live 
by hunting and planting grains. They are poorer than the Cado. 
They are very sociable Indians and very docile and primitive. 

Nacogdochitos 

The Nacogdochitos are near neighbors of the Yuganis, living on 
the same river, Neches. They are very much like the latter except 
in the streaks they make on their faces. They are much more given 
to drunkenness than the Yuganis, and consequently much poorer; 
although they do not fail on this account to till the soil, to construct 
houses, and to hunt. They number about two hundred. 

Aizes 

The Aizes live toward the northeast upon the arroyo Atoyak and 
about twelve leagues from Nacogdoches. They are very much like 
the Cado, differing from them only in language and in the manner 
of shaving their heads. They number about three hundred Indians. 
They pierce their noses and paint their faces with vermilion. They 
are fond of the Spaniards. 


Vidaizes 

The Vidaizes live on the Trinity, below the abandoned village of 
the same name, about fifteen leagues to the east a little to the south. 
They number about three hundred Indians. They go down to Natchi¬ 
toches to exchange their furs. They cultivate the soil. They treat 
the Spaniards well when visiting in their pueblos. Their customs are 
like those of the Cado. 



TEXAS IN 1819-1820 


4 7 


Alibamo 

The Alibamo live in three pueblos in the same direction on the said 
river at no great distance from the Vidaizes. They number about 
six hundred Indians. They are liberal and industrious and indulge 
in hunting, by which they gain their livelihood. They go down to 
Nacogdoches with their furs which they exchange like the other 
Indians. They use firewater, and paint their faces. They are kind, 
and their customs and inclinations are not barbarous; although they 
are superstitious like the other Indians. 

Conchate 

The Conchate live further down on the same river and toward 
the east. They number about five hundred Indians. Their customs 
and inclinations differ in no way from those of the other tribes 
referred to, although they are found to be more given to the use of 
firewater. Some of them are seen to be gayly adorned with the 
plumage of birds on their heads, dressed in flowered chintz shirts, 
their faces painted with vermilion, and with silver pendants hang¬ 
ing from their noses. They have considerable trade and are great 
hunters without neglecting to cultivate the soil. They trade in furs 
with the foreigners from whom they receive merchandise and other 
things they may need. 


Chato y Chata 

The Chato and Chata, who live on the Sabine river, not very far 
from the sea, look very much like the Conchate so far as adornment 
goes. They are also given to drunkenness. Many of them know 
French. Their customs are like those of the Cado. Their trade in 
furs, with the foreigners, is considerable. These people, who live 
very near neighbors to each other, number about eight hundred per¬ 
sons. They till the soil and live in houses of wood. 

Orcoquisac 

The Orcoquisac are located at the mouth of the Trinity river. 
They number about three hundred Indians. They resemble the 
Yuganis; although they do not streak their faces. Their occupations 
are limited to hunting and farming. They go down to the seashore 
from whence they secure the fragments of ships and other things cast 
up by the sea. They know how to manage a canoe, and they are 
excellent swimmers. They carry their furs to Carcashu and Oppe- 
lousas to exchange with foreigners who live in those settlements, which 
are under the jurisdiction of the United States, and which are not 
far from the coast. Their customs are very good, although idolatrous. 


48 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


They performed many services for the troops who were stationed at 
Atascocito, also called Orcoquisac, until the year 1812, when the fron¬ 
tier was abandoned. 

Nacazil 

The Nacazil live on the Neches river near the lagoons where it 
empties into the sea. They number about two hundred. Their cus¬ 
toms are simple. They are fond of hunting and of farming. They 
frequent the sea coast and visit Atascocito when troops are stationed 
there. They are skilled in the management of canoes, and they go 
in them to Oppelousas and Carcashu with their products. They drink 
all kinds of liquors, of which they are very fond. 

Cocos 

The Cocos, who number about four hundred, seldom leave the 
coast between Bahia de Matagorda and the mouth of the Brazos river 
where they live without any fixed habitation. They live on fish and 
wild game; and, because of the little traffic they have with foreigners, 
they are without necessities and ornaments. However, they trade 
with the neighboring tribes. Their customs are not very different 
from those of the other Indians. By nature, they are tractable. They 
look like the Yuganis. 

San Pedro 

The San Pedro Indians live on the Trinity river above the aban¬ 
doned village of this name, to the northeast, about twenty leagues. 
They plant crops and hunt. They have good inclinations and simple 
customs. They do not shave their faces, although they cut their hair 
in such a way as to make them different from the Texas Indians, their 
neighbors. They rarely go down to Natchitoches, but there is no lack 
of foreigners who carry merchandise to the pueblos. They are but 
little addicted to firewater. They are liberal and generous with what 
they have. They build their houses of straw because it is easier than 
wood. But their houses are large and usually neat. This tribe con¬ 
sists of about five hundred persons. 

Texas 

The Texas are near neighbors of the San Pedro Indians, living 
on the said river and in the same direction. There is a great sim¬ 
ilarity between these two tribes and the difference can scarcely be 
distinguished, except by the way they cut their hair and by the name. 
They number about four hundred Indians. They are fond of hunt¬ 
ing, but they till the soil. They are like their neighbors, the San 
Pedro Indians, and rarely go down to Natchitoches. 


TEXAS IN 1819-1820 


49 


Quichas 

The Quichas live toward la Tortuga, which is in a northerly direc¬ 
tion, about fifty leagues from Trinidad. They differ but little from 
the Texas and the San Pedro Indians. They employ themselves in 
farming and in hunting wild animals. They are in the habit of going 
to Trinidad, but their usual trips are made to Natchitoches, although 
foreigners do not fail to come to their pueblos because it is on the 
road to the Comanches and Tehuacanos. They number about eight 
hundred Indians. 

Nadacos 

The Nadacos live on the Sabine river above the Chato and the 
Chata Indians, and near the Cado. They number about two hun¬ 
dred Indians. They are darker than the latter and some of them shave 
their faces in streaks. They plant considerable crops and are hunters. 
They have a close friendship with the Cado, whom they ordinarily 
accompany on their hunting trips. They are primitive and humane. 
They are given to the use of firewater because of their extensive 
trade with foreigners. 

All these tribes, who live in the wooded region which lies between 
the Trinity river and the frontier of the United States, preserve 
reciprocally an inviolable peace and a perfect harmony. They, how¬ 
ever, are strongly built, well developed, brave, and vigorous. They 
resist fatigue and the extremes of that changeable climate at all 
seasons; for they are accustomed to it. They have the particular 
distinction of not having joined the faction of the traitor Bernardo 
Gutierrez, when, at the head of the Anglo-Americans and accursed 
Spaniards, he invaded the Province of Texas, having previously sent 
Spanish and French emissaries among them; that is, with the excep¬ 
tion of the Conchate who, with one hundred Indians of this nation, 
aided the traitors to carry the war in Bahia del Espiritu Santo and 
later at the battle of Rosillo; but when Gutierrez’s army had taken 
the plaza of Bexar and had beheaded the Spanish leaders and other 
officials, the Conchate retired to their pueblos. 

The ordinary dress of these nations is deer skins which they them¬ 
selves tan. They also wear shirts of chintz or flowered goods. Their 
wives dress in the same way. Some of them have married foreigners. 
They are not so dirty nor so ugly. They might even pass as hand¬ 
some, if they should be given a good and careful education—par¬ 
ticularly the Cado. 

Hostile Tribes 

The hostile tribes are the Comanches, the Lipans, the Tancahues, 
the Tahuayases, the Tahuacanos, and the Aguajes. They are scat¬ 
tered over the plains which lie between the neighborhood of New 


50 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Mexico and the Province of Texas. The first three are wandering 
tribes, and the others live in fixed settlements on the rivers of Brazos 
de Dios and Colorado de Natchitoches. In their customs, they are 
very different from the tribes on the frontier; although, like the 
Indians, they farm and hunt. 

Comanches 

The Comanches, who are the most numerous and who cover the 
greater part of that vast region toward the north, are treacherous, 
revengeful, sly, untrustworthy, ferocious, and cruel, when victorious; 
and cowardly and low, when conquered. They are inclined towards 
rapine and murder of their fellow-beings. 

Like cowards, they mutilate the bodies of the dead and, some¬ 
times, they eat their prisoners after torturing them to death. They 
are inconstant in their friendships and break their contracts for any 
cause. They are perfidious and disloyal. They love their liberty so 
much that they will not bear servitude; and to have peace with them 
it is necessary to subdue them by arms. It is certain that they are 
not reducible to the Catholic religion. 

Their ordinary food is the buffalo and other animals of the chase. 
They also eat horses and mules [even] when not forced to. They 
never plant any crops. Their sole occupation is hunting and war. 
The rest of the time they spend in idleness and crime. 

They live a wandering life and when they remain in one place it 
is only for ten or twelve days while their animals are grazing the land 
bare and they themselves are driving away all the game. 

Although there are chiefs among them, that is, one in each pueblo, 
who understands war, they respect and obey him when they wish, 
without noting him particularly. And if they follow him to war, it 
is because of the love they have for murder and theft. They pre¬ 
serve no order or formality in leaving him or in following him . . . 

They have many wives, as many as each Indian can support. 
Some of them have as many as eight. They are not clean. They 
wear only a breechclout. For the rest, they go almost naked. Only 
in the winter do they cover themselves with buffalo skins, which they 
have tanned themselves. They have great skill in arranging their 
hair with paints and oils, adding to the mixture some artificial braids 
of horse hair tied with strands of cloth which almost reach to the 
ground. The greatest insult you can offer a Comanche is to pull his 
braids. 

They know no religion except idolatry with all the superstitions 
which the devil has suggested to them through their witches or magi¬ 
cians, who are not lacking among them. 

Their riches consist in the possession of good horses and arms, 
which they will not sell, even though they be paid an exorbitant price. 
They do not lack silver ornaments such as jeweled swords, and 


TEXAS IN 1819-1820 


51 


ornaments from bridles, which they steal in their expeditions and 
campaigns. They have never made so many of these as in the last 
year, due entirely to the encouragement given them by the foreigners 
and certain perverse Spaniards because of their covetousness, to the 
detriment of the provinces, as is to be explained. 

Up to the year 1811, the Comanches were not so well armed, 
nor so war-like, nor had they penetrated into places where they are 
now seen. The revolution which broke out in the center of the king¬ 
dom, at that time, came to the ears of those Indians; and, since they 
are of a war-like nature, changeable, and treacherous, it was easy to 
seduce them from their allegiance to the legitimate authorities. They 
took advantage of the occasion when they saw the troops with other 
duties, and hastened to make war against the unarmed herdsmen and 
the peaceable settlers, robbing, killing, and seizing prisoners. In these 
raids, they collected a great number of animals, both horses and mules, 
leaving horror and devastation in this industry in the Province of 
Texas and on the frontiers of the other Provinces. . . . 

This nation is divided into the Yambaricas and the Yucanticas. 
The former live to the north and west from the plains at the head¬ 
waters of the rivers to the region near New Mexico. I do not know 
the number of people they have. They rarely go to the coast. The 
Yucanticas live from the country of the Yambaricas to the region 
near Texas. They have ten or twelve pueblos governed by the per¬ 
son most noted for bravery, intrepidity, and ferocity. Their number, 
counting both the western and northern branches, may be estimated 
at six hundred persons. They make war against all the neighboring 
nations. . . At the present time, they are at peace with the Lipanes, 
who have always been their bitter enemies. 

Lipanes 

The Lipanes unite all the vices of the Comanches with those 
peculiar to themselves—the quality of being very astute and daring 
in their hostile expeditions they have acquired from the long com¬ 
munication they have had with the Spaniards during times of peace. 
Therefore, to their natural barbarity, they add a considerable knowl¬ 
edge of the art of war. 

It has not been possible to induce them to live in fixed habitations. 
They love liberty and are greatly interested in their ideas of idolatry 
and heathen rites. They ordinarily live on game and wild fruits. 
They also eat horse meat when forced to do so. And, although they 
like Spanish cooking, they are not inclined to cultivate the soil. 

In times of peace, they live on the frontiers of Coahuila, Neuvo 
Leon and Tamaulipas, pitching their camps are far as the Province 
of Texas. Many of them have learned to speak Castilian; although 
with a poor pronunciation, but they understand it very well. Their 
commerce is limited to tanned deer and buffalo skins which they paint 


52 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

with great skill. They also sell horses and mules which they take 
in their round-ups. 

They have many wives like the Comanches. . . This nation 
amounts to something like seven hundred of all ages and sexes. Many 
of them have learned to play cards, which they do with great skill. 

Tancahues 

The Tancahues live a wandering life on the margins of the 
Guadalupe, San Marcos, Colorado, and Brazos. In customs, inclina¬ 
tions, and modes of living, they are very similar to the Comanches 
and the Lipanes, of whom they are sometimes enemies. They are not 
so warlike as those Indians, but they are not entirely lacking in valor 
and disposition to carry on offensive warfare and to defend them¬ 
selves. However, on the other hand, they are lazier and greater 
knaves—from this arises their poverty and misery. 

They are but little inclined to the chase. They live mostly on wild 
fruits and fish. Their commerce is exceedingly meager because of 
their laziness and their scant traffic with foreigners. They are not 
so ferocious as the Comanches. They do not exceed five hundred in 
numbers. 

They are idolatrous and superstitious, and have many wives. They 
paint their faces and arms so as to form different figures, cutting 
themselves with lancets, and using charcoal. At present they are 
peaceable because of the war they are engaged in with the other 
nations. 


Tahuacanos 

The Tahuacanos live on the banks of the Brazos, on fixed settle¬ 
ments, towards the northeast, about ninety leagues from Bexar. 
They resemble other barbarians in their moral customs, but they differ 
widely from them in other things. They cultivate the soil from which 
they gather an abundance of fruits upon which they live, together with 
the products of the chase to which they are also inclined. When they 
are at peace with the Spaniards, they receive them and treat them 
kindly. They are superstitious and lovers of idolatry. They have 
many wives. They make war against the Comanches over buffalo 
hunting, and against the Tancahues for stealing their crops. Their 
huts are of straw, but of good size and clean and well shaped. They 
number about eight hundred persons. They live in three pueblos. 
They trade with foreigners from whom they receive arms, ammuni¬ 
tion, tobacco, and other merchandise. This is why they are at war 
with the Spaniards. Their granaries are under ground. In them, 
they preserve their seeds for two years. They paint their arms and 
faces like the Tancahues, although they use different figures. 


TEXAS IN 1819-1820 


53 


Tahuayases 

The Tahuayases live on the river Colorado de Natchitoches, above 
this settlement. They do not differ very greatly from the Tahu- 
acanos, whose customs and traits they share. Like the Tahuacanos, 
they cultivate the soil, and are fond of hunting by which they live. 
They make war against the Comanches and against other barbarous 
nations of the north. Their houses are like those of the Tahuacanos. 
Some are of wood. They are accustomed to go down to Bexar. Be¬ 
sides, they trade with other nations. Some of these Indians are white, 
due to their mixture with foreigners, who are accustomed to visit their 
pueblos by way of the Colorado de Natchitoches in order to trade in 
furs. They number a little over one thousand. 

Aguajes 

The Aguajes live to the north of the Tahuayases. They are much 
like the Comanches in customs and habits. They trade their furs to 
foreigners and never visit Bexar because of the distance, and their 
occupation of war with the other hostile nations of the north. Their 
number reaches to a little more than eight hundred persons of all ages 
and sexes. 

II. Instructions Which the Constitutional Ayuntamiento of 
the City of San Fernando de Bexar Draws Up in Order 
That Its Provincial Deputy May be Able to Make Such 
Representations, Take Such Steps, and Present Such Peti¬ 
tions as May be Conducive to the Happiness, Development, 
and Prosperity of Its Inhabitants 

The length of this province, from north to south, is about 300 
leagues of known country from [the mouth of the] Nueces River to 

the-in the Province of New Mexico. From east to west, it 

is about 200 leagues from the Medina to the known limits of the 
Province of Nueva Viscaya at its union with the United States. In 
this region are seen the finest and most copious springs, rivers, lakes, 
and lagoons, which water it and furnish life to a great number of wild 
but very useful products—to numerous herds of animals, cattle, buf¬ 
falo, and other kinds of wild creatures, which furnish the greatest aid 
to subsistence, to a large number of wild horses, to countless animals 
of the chase, and to fish, woods, and other valuable products which 
promise the benefits of the best mineral ores ever seen. There are 
3000 persons in the province. 

The settlements which the province contains in this spacious and 
extensive region are only the city of San Fernando de Bexar, its 
capital—to which are added the presidial company of Bexar, the flying 



54 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

squadron of San Carlos de Parras, and the four missions—almost 
abandoned, since in three of them are no more than fifteen Spams 
families, and none in the other; the presidio of Bahia del Espiritu 
Santo [Goliad], near which also there are two Indian missions, almost 
abandoned, since the Indians live in them only during the seasons 
which suit them—these are all located upon the San Antonio river 
within the short distance of fifty or sixty leagues to the southeast; and, 
finally, the advanced and deserted pueblo of Nacogdoches on the fron¬ 
tier of the United States toward the east. Nacogdoches is distant 
from the other settlements 180 leagues. 

The remainder of this extensive, immense, and spacious region 
composing the entire province is occupied by the different tribes of 
barbarous Indians, who, at all times, have been masters of the posses¬ 
sions and lives of the unfortunate inhabitants—but never with such 
tenacity and frequency as since the year 1813, at which time, after 
they had made away with the cattle, horses, and other property of 
the inhabitants within the space of a few days, killing and capturing 
a considerable number of persons of all ages, conditions, and sexes, 
they continued menacing the interior of Coahuila, the colony of Nueva 
Santander, and a portion of the kingdom of Nuevo Reyno de Leon, 
in such a manner that the first of these and the four northern villas 
of the second suffered the same fate as Texas in regard to their 
property, although, without doubt, they have had a greater number 
murdered and captured among their citizens. 

And what nations are those who have occasioned such unheard of 
evils? They are no other than the Comanches and Li panes. We do 
not know the reason for such neglect and tolerance by the govern¬ 
ment in not suppressing them. ... It seems an urgent necessity that 
this province be given the following aid at once: 

1st. By means of a respectable and well-organized campaign, the 
two nations, the Comanches and the Lipanes, who have occasioned 
so many evils in the province during these last years, should be fol¬ 
lowed until they are exterminated or forced to an inviolable and last¬ 
ing peace, managing, if possible, to intrust the expedition to officials 
hardened to an active life, familiar with the country, and experienced 
in the methods of making war against this kind of an enemy. There is 
no doubt that this would serve as an example to restrain the other 
nations who, in imitation of these or in union with them, have con¬ 
tributed to the destruction of the province. 

2d. The campaign concluded with the happy ending that we 
promise ourselves and have a right to expect if the troops assigned 
to it set out mounted, equipped, and supplied with every necessity, it 
is fitting that there be established a line of presidios to guard this 
frontier, extending from the old presidio of San Saba to that of 
Nacogdoches, establishing them with the necessary force. These 
presidios should be established, one at San Saba, another at San 


TEXAS IN 1819-1820 


55 


Xavier [near the present town of Rockdale], another on the Brazos, 
another on the Tortuga, another on the Trinity, and the last at Nacog¬ 
doches on the frontier of the United States. It would be well for the 
Province of Coahuila to settle or protect—by means of one or two 
presidios —the unsettled or unprotected country from San Saba to the 
villa of San Fernando de Agua Verde, as much for its own safety 
as for that of the two remaining provinces, Tamaulipas and Nuevo 
Leon. 

3d. This line established, it is proper that the coasts of the Bay 
of San Bernardo be protected by one or two presidios which could be, 
and should be, established at Atascocito and halfway between the 
Brazos and the Colorado rivers. 

4th. For all these establishments, there are judged to be very 
indispensable and very necessary two thousand soldiers, with full pay 
and other necessary supplies, in order to attract to the settlement 
all kinds of people useful in these lands. 

5th. To all these new establishments, as advantageous as well 
as fitted for the peace and safety of this and the three neighboring 
settlements [the settlers] should give assistance, in order that they 
may be effective, since they would be interested parties in the benefits 
which must accrue to them, contributing aid according to their means, 
so that in the future the evils which they are now suffering may not 
be experienced. . . . 

6th. [We recommend] that the Port of Matagorda be aided, 
protected, and developed with everything necessary. . . . 

7th. That the Province of New Mexico, El Paso del Norte, and 
other places in Neuva Viscaya be placed in communication with this 
province, aiding these places with some settlements or presidios which 
may be established in the short distance of 150 leagues existing be¬ 
tween its capital, Santa Fe, and this [capital]. By this means, its 
inhabitants, in addition to the benefits and advantages which would 
result to all the kingdom, can have the privilege of importing the 
goods they need and of exporting the grain and other products from 
their territory through the said port of Matagorda in the Bay of San 
Bernardo, as was requested in 1812 by their deputy to the cortes, Don 
Pedro Baptista Pino. 

8th. That all the supplies of grain, stock, and other things fur¬ 
nished from the year 1813 to the past year of 1819 by the citizens 
of this place be paid for as soon as possible in order that, in this way, 
they may be repaid in part for their losses and arrears from which 
they have suffered and so that with it they may improve their fields 
and the industries they may seek to promote. 

9th. That restitution be made of the houses, fields, and other 
property which still remain unsold from those confiscated from the 
citizens of this place, who, in the above mentioned year of 1813, fled to 
the United States, doing the same with the estates sold or ceded when 


56 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


claims are made to them by their original and legitimate owners 
according to the constitution which was in force at that time. Diffi¬ 
culties must arise in this restitution. These will be solved by return¬ 
ing to the purchasers what they gave [for the property], leaving to 
them the inalienable right to put in a claim for the improvements which 
they have made. 

ioth. That there be distributed vacant lands and fields for the 
inhabitants of the entire province upon the rivers, San Antonio, 
Medina, Guadalupe, San Marcos, Colorado, San Saba, and others 
suitable for the proposed purpose, distributing, also, the fields which 
belong to the four abandoned missions near this capital, except those 
of the mission of Concepcion. . . . 

nth. That for the purpose of raising new funds or for increas¬ 
ing those collected, there should be placed at the disposal of this 
ayuntamiento , with exact notices and reports, the proceeds from the 
cattle, horses, and mules of unknown owners collected since the year 
1814 or 1815 up to the present time. . . . 

The citizens should be permitted to round-up wild horses. This 
by order of the Commandant-General, Don Joaquin de Arredondo, 
they are prohibited from doing, because it is alleged that they wish 
to make this their sole occupation. The old established custom should 
be enforced of paying two reales per head, and of rounding them up 
only in the months from November to February or March. This rule 
should apply to the soldiers as well as to the civilians. 

12th. That the system in practice since the above mentioned 
year of 1813 to the present time of maintaining in the province a 
strong garrison of troops useless for performing the active services 
of their calling which the circumstances of the day demand, has been 
only a certain means of consummating the ruin of its inhabitants; 
for the soldier, finding himself unmounted, unclothed, and without 
supplies—what service can he perform and how can he exist with only 
two almudes of corn which he receives every fortnight, unless, in 
order to maintain himself, he lays hands upon some one’s cow which 
he kills in the fields, now upon things which he steals from the corn 
fields, or now, by other excesses, such as necessity forces him to 
commit, as is frequently seen practiced upon the public who suffer 
these damages. This will be remedied by furnishing the soldiers with 
sufficient and suitable rations or by arranging for them to retire to their 
own province in spite of the urgent need there is for them in this 
province and of the good which might result from their service, were 
they in the condition required for performing it instead of being 
forced to maintain themselves or live at the expense of the citizens. 

13th. The Province of Texas is more than 500 leagues distant 
from the port of Vera Cruz—the first and foremost port of this 
America—something more than 300 leagues from the port of Alta- 
mira, eighty from the most advanced settlements of Coahuila and 


TEXAS IN 1819-1820 


57 


Tamaulipas, and 150 or 200 leagues from the villa of Saltillo and the 
city of Monterey; and there is in circulation in it no other money 
than the small salary which the troops receive some months. As a 
result of this, the goods and supplies which its inhabitants receive 
from such remote distances are held at excessively increased and ex¬ 
orbitant prices and with the stern necessity of paying for them in 
cash if some merchant does not graciously supply them in exchange 
for grain at a price which best suits him; for, if he pays two and a 
half pesos a bushel he, thereupon, resells it at from four to six pesos 
to the same person from whom he bought it if he cannot turn it over 
all at once in payment of the troops at the same or at greater profits. 
This is as injurious to the soldier as to the civilian; because, if they 
had money or if [the authorities] would observe some rule in supply¬ 
ing grain to the troops, they would be assured of their support with 
greater ease, and the laborers would be benefited and would devote 
themselves to their work with greater pleasure. 

14th. Since the inhabitants of the province have within their 
midst a port so excellent as is the port of Matagorda, where at first 
and second hand the goods needed could be received with great ease 
and that too, perhaps, in exchange for the products of their own soil 
without the necessity of expending any money whatever, we can find 
no reason or justice to convince us that we should be deprived of a bene¬ 
fit which nature has so liberally bestowed upon us. For this reason, we 
repeat the request for the opening of the said port in order to destroy, at 
its roots, the odious contraband trade across the frontier of which 
some of the citizens of this place are accused. We have not yet seen 
progress made in this manner. Yet, if some practice it, it is not from 
ambition to accumulate riches, but because of the miseries they suffer 
and the ease with which they can relieve their sufferings by the sale 
of any kind of horses for which there is at least fifty per cent profit 
in current money or in very useful goods. In this way, they supply 
their necessities. And, if this is the only relief these inhabitants re¬ 
ceive, there is no reason for depriving them of it by seizing upon 
the contraband goods they accumulate. 

15th. The missions of this province contain only the small num¬ 
ber of 278 inhabitants. These are governed by a local alcalde, ap¬ 
pointed and approved by the government and subject in all matters 
to its authority and ministered by a priest from the College of Nuestra 
Senora de Guadalupe, with the rank of president who, since he has 
no assistance from his stipend for the purpose of providing for sub¬ 
sistence, is compelled to abandon the missions at certain times to 
obtain alms. The two priests who serve the missions of la Bahia del 
Espiritu Santo do the same thing. If they were paid the proper 
salaries, without doubt, they would dedicate themselves to their min¬ 
istry. 

16th. The branded horses which are captured from the Indians 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


SB 

or from other enemies either by means of a campaign, a skirmish, or 
other military operation, should also very properly be turned over to 
the treasurer who may be named, in order that he may hand them 
over to their owners or sell those without known owners for the 
benefit of the fund which should be created in this city. 

17th. If all and each one of the articles contained in these in¬ 
struction be placed in execution and certain practice, we shall already 
have begun the prosperity of this province, the happiness of its cit¬ 
izens, and the security of the kingdom of New Spain. This we can 
see accomplished in no other way than by seizing the happy moment 
which offers us national freedom; or we will be submerged in the 
confused, abominable, and horrible chaos of forgetfulness and aban¬ 
donment. 

November 15, 1820. 

To the Governor to be sent to the Deputy for the Province, Don 
Ambrosia Aldasoro. 


CHAPTER VII 


THE BEGINNINGS OF THE AMERICAN SETTLEMENT 
OF TEXAS 

By Eugene C. Barker 


[This account of the inauguration of the Anglo-American settlement of 
Texas is taken from Chapter III of the Life of Stephen F. Austin by Eugene 
C. Barker. For the circumstances leading to Moses Austin’s application for 
permission to settle a colony in Texas and for Stephen F. Austin’s trip 
to Mexico to get his father’s grant confirmed, see Chapters II and IV of the 
same work. 

Read in addition: Garrison, Texas, Chapter XIII; Barker, Potts, and Rams- 
dell, A School History of Texas, 61-83; and the following articles in the 
Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association: “Journal of Stephen F. 
Austin on His First Trip to Texas,” VII, 287-307; W. S. Lewis, “Adventures 
of the Lively Immigrants,” III, 1-32, 81-107; L. G. Bugbee, “What Became of 
the Lively,” III, 141-148; J. H. Kuykendall, “Reminiscences of Early Texans,” 
VI, 236-253, 311-30; VII, 29-64. There is a wealth of material on this topic 
in Eugene C. Barker (ed.), The Austin Papers, I, 371-600, published by the 
Government Printing Office, Washington.] 


How long Moses Austin had the Texas venture definitely in mind 
and what preliminary preparations he made for it cannot be clearly 
determined. In a memorandum written for his younger brother some 
time before 1829, Stephen F. Austin said that he and his father dis¬ 
cussed the project in 1819 after the signing of the Florida treaty, and 
that the farm which he opened on Red River was intended as a resting 
place for emigrants and a base of supply until sufficient improve¬ 
ments could be developed to sustain them in the wilderness of Texas. 

In a pamphlet which he published in 1829 he added that the location 
at Long Prairie proved unhealthful and investigation convinced him 
that the best route was through Natchitoches or New Orleans, and 
hence the farm was abandoned. He goes on to say that in the sum¬ 
mer of 1820 it was agreed at Little Rock that his father should go 
to the capital of Texas and apply for permission to establish a colony, 
while he himself proceeded to New Orleans to prepare for the trans¬ 
portation of the families, if the petition was granted. It is doubtful, 
however, whether the plan was thought out so deliberately as this/ 
would indicate. A letter from Moses Austin to his younger son in 
February, 1820, shows a good deal of uncertainty—“I shall go down 
the country in the spring,” he wrote, "to see your brother and deter- 

59 


\ 


60 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


mine what I shall do.” And Stephen F. Austin’s own letters at the 
end of 1820 disclaim knowledge of his father’s plans. 

Nevertheless, Moses Austin had had some thought of trading to 
Texas as early as 1813; in September, 1819, he was contemplating a 
trip to San Antonio; and tentative consideration of some sort of 
operation in the “Spanish Country” is suggested in January, 1820, by 
Moses Austin’s requesting a friend at Washington to obtain for him 
a copy of the passport that he carried to Missouri in 1797 * Oc¬ 
tober he was in conference with Stephen at Little Rock, and some 
time the next month set out for Bexar with a gray horse, a mule, a 
negro man, and fifty dollars in cash—a total value of $850—for which 
he was “to account to S. F. Austin or return them.” On November 27, 
he was at McGuffin’s, a noted landmark about midway between Natch¬ 
itoches and the Sabine. 

He reached Bexar on December 23, in company with his servant 
Richmond and two companions whom he had encountered near 
Natchitoches, and was subjected to a searching examination. In an¬ 
swer to questions, he declared that he was fifty-three years old, a 
Catholic, and a former subject of the King of Spain—as was proved 
by his passport of 1797; that with his family he wished to settle in 
Texas and cultivate cotton, sugar, and corn; and that he had brought 
with him no goods to trade, having only an escopeta, a pistol, two 
horses, some clothing for personal use, and the necessary traveling 
funds. In his application he added that he was a native of Connect¬ 
icut and a resident of Missouri, that he was moved by the reestablish¬ 
ment of the liberal constitution in Spain to request permission to 
settle in the empire, and that he represented three hundred families 
who also desired to carry out the same object and thereby fulfill the 
King’s intention at the time of the sale of Louisiana to allow his sub¬ 
jects to move into any part of his remaining dominions. The exam¬ 
ination of Austin’s companions disclosed that one, Jacob Kirkham, 
was a farmer from Natchitoches searching for four runaway slaves, 
and that the other, Jacob Forsai (Forsythe), was a native of Vir¬ 
ginia who came from Natchitoches to ask permission to settle in Texas. 

In his pamphlet of 1829 Stephen F. Austin gives some details of 
his father’s reception. Governor Martinez at first, without examin¬ 
ing his papers, ordered him to leave Bexar “instantly and the province 
as soon as he could get out of it.” Crossing the plaza to his lodgings, 
Austin met Baron de Bastrop, whom he had known years before in 
Louisiana, and Bastrop took his documents and intervened with the 
governor. A second interview was allowed, the ayuntamiento was 
consulted, and after three days’ deliberation Martinez agreed to for¬ 
ward Austin’s application to the commandant general and recommend 
its approval. It is evident that Austin’s former Spanish citizenship 
carried the day. 

Texas was in that administrative division of New Spain known 


BEGINNINGS OF THE AMERICAN SETTLEMENT 61 


as the Eastern Interior Provinces, including, besides Texas, Nuevo 
Leon, Coahuila, and Santander or Tamaulipas. At its head was the 
commandant general, Joaquin de Arredondo, with supreme civil and 
military jurisdiction over the four provinces, and it was to him that 
Martinez sent Austin’s petition. Acting on the advice of the provin¬ 
cial deputation, a sort of federal council representing the provinces, 
Arredondo granted the application on January 17, 1821. 

In the meantime Austin had returned to the United States to await 
the answer to his petition. He was at McGuffin’s again on January 
15, where he recorded in his methodical way that the total expense 
of himself and his servant Richmond for the trip had been $25.78. 
He had traveled at least part of the way back with Kirkham, whom 
he found to be both reckless and dishonest. Kirkham had told him 
before leaving San Antonio that some Spaniards wanted to return 
with them to Natchitoches. At the San Marcos, some fifty miles east¬ 
ward, he disclosed that these men would join the party on the Colo¬ 
rado with a drove of mules and horses, some of them stolen from 
the government corral, and that he had promised to buy them. To 
Austin’s protest that such trade, even when the animals were not 
stolen, was contrary to the law and the orders of the governor, Kirk¬ 
ham blandly insisted that he had done nothing to encourage the 
Spaniards nor said anything “that would induce them to bring out 
mules except that if they should do so, he would purchase them.” 
Austin was desperately anxious lest the governor should suspect him 
of complicity in the plot and begged the governor to examine the 
Spaniards, who he implies were captured, to discover the truth. At 
the same time he wrote Bastrop that Kirkham was talking promiscu¬ 
ously and declaring openly that he could take goods to San Antonio 
in any quantity and sell them to Lieutenant Sandoval, who had a 
store. “I cannot close this letter,” he said, “without again reminding 
you that both Lieut. Sandoval and yourself are in danger of being 
drawn into difficulty from the extreme imprudence of Kirkham.” 

Expecting to return to Texas permanently in May, Austin asked 
Bastrop to obtain permission in the meantime for him to land tools 
and provisions at the mouth of the Colorado. He would be accom¬ 
panied by twelve or fifteen hands, for whose good conduct he would 
be responsible, and thought that they could in a few days make them¬ 
selves safe from the Indians. He seemed confident that the petition 
to settle three hundred families would be granted, but implied that 
he would himself remove to the province whether or not the contract 
was allowed. 

There was a tradition in Austin’s family that Kirkham deserted 
on the way back to Natchitoches, taking with him pack animals and pro¬ 
visions and leaving Austin and his servant to live on roots and berries 
and make their way to the settlements alone. Stephen F. Austin 
declared that damage to his powder, which prevented him from killing 


62 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


game, compelled his father to subsist for the last eight days of the 
journey on roots and acorns, and that Moses Austin reached McGuf- 
fin’s so ill from fatigue and exposure that he was in bed for three 
weeks. As to the hardships of the trip there can be no doubt, for 
Austin himself wrote, “I have returned from St. Antonio in the 
Province of Texas . . . after undergoing everything but death”; and 
the negro, Richmond, was so exhausted that he had to be left at the 
Sabine with Douglass Forsythe. But there are evidently some inaccu¬ 
racies in the tradition. Austin in the letters in which he tries to clear 
himself of responsibility for Kirkham does not mention Kirkham’s 
desertion; and his return to Natchitoches consumed less time than 
the trip to San Antonio, so that he could not have lost much time 
from illness on the way. He was delayed after his arrival at Natch¬ 
itoches, however, for he did not reach home until March 23. 

He wrote his son James, who was in school at Lexington, Ken¬ 
tucky, that he could settle his business in a few days, and expected 
to be in New Orleans in May. He already had applications which 
would fill his colony, if the petition was allowed, and from which he 
expected to obtain $18,000 in fees, but he gave no details of his plans. 
Ten days later he wrote, “I have made a visit to St. Antonio and 
obtained liberty to settle in that country. As I am ruined in this, I 
found nothing I could do would bring back my property again, and 
to remain in a Country where I had enjoyed wealth in a state of 
poverty I could not submit to.” He explained that the governor had 
granted permission for him to settle the three hundred families on a 
tract of two hundred thousand acres on the Colorado, but that it must 
be confirmed by the commandant general before it would be effective. 
He wanted the land surveyed before parceling it out to families, and 
in order to attend to that and to make other preparations for planting 
the colony, he planned to take a force of twenty-five men to Texas 
immediately. The form of contract which he made with the men 
of this advance guard shows the nature of the preparations that he 
had in mind. In return for transportation and subsistence until Jan¬ 
uary 1, 1822, they were to build a house, enclosure, stockade, and block 
house, and to fence and cultivate “a piece of untimbered land in 
corn” and gather the crop into corn houses. Each “emigrant” should 
furnish himself with a good Spanish carbine for defense and should 
pledge himself to respect the king and constitution of Spain. Austin 
would provide farming tools, mules, and oxen, and at the end of his 
service would give each man six hundred and forty acres of land 
and five bushels of corn from the store houses. It did not, 
apparently, occur to his sanguine mind that the season would be too 
far advanced when they reached Texas to raise a crop of corn. An¬ 
other of his plans was to lay off at the mouth of the Colorado the 
town of Austina, which he thought would in a few years equal New 
Orleans “in consequence if not in wealth.” 


BEGINNINGS OF THE AMERICAN SETTLEMENT 63 


During April and May he worked feverishly to arrange his tangled 
affairs. On May 22 he wrote Stephen F. Austin in New Orleans 
that he hoped to finish his business in a day or two, and instructed 
him, if possible, to obtain a vessel and prepare it for the voyage to 
the Colorado without delay. About the middle of the month he had 
received notice of the confirmation of his grant, and wrote with 
elation, “I now can go forward with confidence and I hope and pray 
you will Discharge your Doubts as to the Enterprise . . . Raise your 
Spirits Times are changing a new chance presents itself.” 

But he had never recovered from the exposure and exhaustion 
which he suffered on the return from Texas; he had overtaxed 
himself in his efforts to get back. A few days after writing the letter 
just quoted, he went to Hazel Run, the home of his daughter, Mrs. 
James Bryan, and was stricken by pneumonia. He was attended by 
Dr. John M. Bernhisel, a youthful disciple of the celebrated Dr. 
Physic of the University of Pennsylvania, who “blistered and bled 
most copiously” and temporarily relieved him, but on June 10 he died. 
Almost his dying request was that Stephen F. Austin should carry out 
his vision. “He called me to his bedside,” wrote Mrs. Austin, “and 
with much distress and difficulty of speech beged me to tell you to 
take his place and if god in his wisdom thought best to disappoint 
him in the accomplishment of his wishes and plans formed for the 
benefit of his family, he prayed him to extend his goodness to you 
and enable you to go on with the business in the same way he would 
have done.” 

Moses Austin was enterprising, industrious, and of indomitable 
energy, but it is doubtful whether he could have accomplished the task 
to which he set his hand. It required deliberateness, patience, tact, 
ability to make allowances, diplomacy of a high order. He was, as 
we have seen, impetuous, irascible, belligerent, even litigious in de¬ 
fense of his rights—all of which would, on the one hand, have kept 
him in a state of perpetual warfare with the frontiersmen of similar 
qualities who formed the colony, and on the other hand have rendered 
him entirely unfit to pilot the settlement successfully through the 
labyrinth of Mexican suspicion and jealousy. 

Besides his father's injunction to discharge his doubts, there is 
a good deal of evidence to show Stephen F. Austin's hesitation to 
enter the Texas venture. In April, 1820, he wrote his brother-in-law 
from Arkansas: “I shall remain here this summer, and after that 
it is uncertain where I shall go. If my father saves enough to sup¬ 
port him and you get through your difficulties, ... I shall be sat¬ 
isfied.” In June he wrote again: “If my father should come to 
Little Rock you may tell him that I wish to go to the mouth of 
White River to live if I can take anything there to begin with 
and if that cannot be done I shall go down the Mississippi and 
seek employ.” Though he accepted Governor Miller's appointment 


64 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


to the judicial bench in July, at the end of August he was in Louisiana 
and apparently intended to remain there, for on December 2 a corre¬ 
spondent expressed the hope that Austin would soon be permanently 
settled in his new situation. January 20, 1821, he wrote his mother 
that he knew nothing of his father’s objects or prospects, though he 
understood that he was to return to Natchitoches in February. As 
to himself, he had gone to New Orleans to get employment: “I 
offered to hire myself out as a clerk, as an overseer, or anything else, 
but business is too dull here to get into business. There are hundreds 
of young men who are glad to work for their board.” In this situa¬ 
tion, he had met Joseph H. Hawkins, 1 a lawyer, whose brother he had 
known at Lexington, and Hawkins had offered to teach him law, 
boarding him and lending him books and money for clothes. 

An offer so generous [said Austin] and from a man who two months ago 
was a stranger to me, has almost made me change my opinion of the human 
race. There are however two obstacles in the way; one is that I shall earn 
nothing to help you with for at least 18 months; another is that perhaps those 
I owe in Missouri may prosecute here. ... It will take me 18 months to become 
acquainted with civil law which is in force in this country and learn the French 
language—that once done I then shall have the means of fortune within my 
reach. I am determined to accept of Hawkins’ offer. 

In the meantime, he was assisting in editing the Louisiana 
Advertiser. 

This plan was changed by Moses Austin’s success in Texas. His 
letter of May 22 indicates previous correspondence with Stephen, but 
none of it has survived. It is evident, however, that they understood 
each other, and we know that it was Moses Austin’s proposal which 
brought Hawkins into the Texan undertaking. On receipt of his 
mother’s letter of June 8 telling of his father’s desperate illness and 
one from James Bryan repeating his father’s prayer that he would 
carry out the colonization contract, Stephen on June 18 departed for 
Natchitoches on board the steamboat Beaver to meet the escort which 
Governor Martinez had dispatched to accompany Moses Austin back 
to San Antonio. That his preparations were already made is shown 
by the fact that he took with him from New Orleans “eight or ten” 
men to explore the province, and picked up another of his party, Wil¬ 
liam Little, at the mouth of Red River on the 20th. He anticipated 
the death of his father, and arranged with Hawkins to open his mail 
and notify him by special messenger if it should indeed occur. 

He arrived at Natchitoches on the 26th and found Josef Erasmo 
Seguin, J. M. Berramendi, and several other “Spaniards”—traders one 
suspects—waiting. His party set out on July 3. . . . 

1 Colonel Bryan erroneously says that Austin and J. H. Hawkins were class¬ 
mates at Transylvania University .—A Comprehensive History of Texas, I, 445. 
Hawkins had been speaker of the Kentucky house of representatives, 1810-1813, 
and had succeeded Henry Clay in Congress in 1814, when Clay was appointed 
to the commission to negotiate the treaty of Ghent, closing the War of 1812. 


BEGINNINGS OF THE AMERICAN SETTLEMENT 65 

Seguin wrote Governor Martinez from the Guadalupe that Aus¬ 
tin’s party then numbered sixteen. They impressed him as men of 
consequence with whom the governor would want to make a good 
showing, and he suggested that comfortable quarters be prepared for 
them. . . . 

Martinez received Austin very cordially, recognized him without 
demur as heir to his father’s concession, and entered into detailed 
arrangements for the establishment of the colony, authorizing him to 
explore the lands on the Colorado and sound the river to its mouth, 
and to introduce provisions, tools, and farming implements duty free 
through the port of San Bernard, which had just been legalized by 
the commandant general. Austin must be responsible for the good 
character of the immigrants, admitting none without letters of recom¬ 
mendation from their previous places of residence; and until the 
government could organize the local administration they must “be 
governed by and be subordinate to” Austin. On the 18th Austin pre¬ 
sented a memorandum of a plan, no doubt previously discussed, for 
distribution of land to the colonists, and, subject to slight modifica¬ 
tions by the superior government, Martinez formally approved it the 
following day. 

The ten days spent at San Antonio were busy and full of interest. 
Besides his conferences with the governor, Austin entered into some 
tentative plans with Bastrop and Seguin to acquire control of the 
Indian trade; engaged in a mustang hunt; and recorded in his Journal 
an Indian raid in which one Indian was killed. On the 21st he re¬ 
sumed the road, escorted for a time by the governor, Bastrop, and 
Berramendi. His route lay along the San Antonio River, and the 
first day’s march took the party to the mission of San Juan de Capis¬ 
trano. In his journal, which he kept very sketchily at this stage, he 
commented on the missions and the irrigation system. Arriving at 
La Bahia on Sunday, the 26th, he presented his credentials to the 
alcalde the next day and requested guides, as he had been instructed 
to do by the governor. . . . On the alcalde’s advice Austin engaged 
Manuel Becerra, one of the regidores of the town. . . . 

Traveling along the Opelousas road about sixteen miles to Coleto 
Creek, the party turned down this to the Guadalupe, which it fol¬ 
lowed to the head of San Antonio Bay From this point, on Septem¬ 
ber 7, Austin told the guide to go to the old site of the mission and 
presidio of Bahia. Becerra struck due east, although the place he 
was seeking was near the mouth of Garcitas Creek almost directly 
north. After going fifteen miles, he brought up on the shore of one 
of the inlets of Lavaca Bay. After wandering around the western 
shore of the bay for several days, Austin decided that his guide knew 
nothing about the country and dismissed him. It appears from 
Becerra’s report on his return to Goliad, however, that his ignorance 
arose from the fact that while Austin’s permit only authorized him 


66 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


to explore the Colorado, he seemed to be carefully mapping the valley 
of the Guadalupe and the coast. Continuing northeastward, Austin 
struck the Colorado between the present towns of Columbus and 
Wharton, followed down the river some thirty miles, and turned 
northeastward again to the Brazos, which he reached on the 20th near 
the site of San Felipe, where he later established his capital. Here 
he divided the party for two days to explore both sides of the Brazos, 
and on the 226. set out for Natchitoches, where he arrived October 1. 

In his trip to San Antonio and in his subsequent explorations he 
traversed the region now covered by twenty-three counties, and 
gained a very fair impression of the lower course of the San Antonio, 
Guadalupe, Colorado, and Brazos rivers. In this vast region there 
were only two villages, with a total population, according to the 
governor, of 2,516 souls. These were San Antonio and La Bahia, 
or Goliad. Nacogdoches had been, prior to the revolution and the 
filibustering expeditions which began in 1812, a town of nearly a 
thousand people, but war and rapine scattered the inhabitants, and 
when Moses Austin passed through in the fall of 1820 it was entirely 
abandoned. A few stragglers and American squatters from the 
vicinity were collected by Seguin and given a local organization in the 
summer of 1821; and scattered here and there along the Sabine and 
Red Rivers were isolated families. Of the four missions near San 
Antonio, one was deserted, three were occupied and the land cultivated 
by families from the town, but all were in a state of dilapidation ap¬ 
proaching ruin. The two missions near La Bahia were still main¬ 
tained, but the priests had no real authority, and the Indians came 
and went at will. There were a few soldiers at La Bahia and a strong 
garrison at San Antonio, but the ayuntamiento complained that, un¬ 
mounted, unclothed, and without supplies, they were useless in the 
field and a nuisance in barracks, where they were compelled to eke 
out a tneager subsistence by thieving from the citizens. The pay of 
the soldiers furnished most of the specie in circulation at San An¬ 
tonio. The governor apparently winked at the departure of an occa¬ 
sional drove of horses and mules for Natchitoches and was equally 
blind when venturesome travelers arrived with pack animals loaded 
with tobacco, flour, clothing, shoes, and other comforts of civilized 
life. Austin found money “tolerably plenty” at La Bahia because of 
the trade “from Natchitoches to the coast,” but the town was in a 
state of ruin, and the people lived very poorly, owning a few cattle 
and horses which had escaped the Indians and raising some corn— 
“little furniture or rather none at all in their houses—no knives, eat 
with forks and spoons and their fingers.” It was absolutely neces¬ 
sary for the nation to make some effort to populate the province, 
Governor Martinez said, and the easiest and least expensive way to 
do it was to offer sufficient inducements to bring foreigners quickly to 
the country; hence his welcome to Austin. 


BEGINNINGS OF THE AMERICAN SETTLEMENT 67 


From Natchitoches Austin made to Martinez a full report of his 
reconnaissance, outlined the boundaries which he desired for the 
colony, and submitted his final plan for distributing land to the set¬ 
tlers. While he expected to confine the settlements to the Colorado 
and Brazos valleys and the land between, the reservation which he 
requested was much greater—from the mouth of the Lavaca to its 
source, thence along the watershed between the Guadalupe and Colo¬ 
rado to a point six leagues above the Bexar-Nacogdoches road, then 
parallel with the road to the Brazos-San Jacinto watershed, down that 
to the sea, and along the shore to the point of beginning. He had 
given much thought to the method of distributing land and the quan¬ 
tity to be allowed settlers, and while in San Antonio proposed, as we 
saw, a scale that Martinez approved. Reflection now paused him to 
submit slight changes. He proposed to allow a man, whether married 
or single, six hundred and forty acres, and, in addition, three hun¬ 
dred and twenty acres for a wife, one hundred and sixty for each 
child, and eighty for each slave. The total for a man with wife, 
child, and slave did not differ greatly under the two plans, but the 
man’s headright—and therefore the allowance to single men—was 
reduced from nine hundred and sixty to six hundred and forty acres. 
The original plan had contemplated a town lot for each settler, but 
he now decided to restrict the lots to mechanics, merchants, and pro¬ 
fessional men. This method of division, he explained, was better pro¬ 
portioned to the men of property and conformed to the section, half¬ 
section, and quarter-section grants to which the settlers were accus¬ 
tomed in the United States. 

Fifty or more families from the vicinity of Nacogdoches had 
agreed to move to his grant in November and December, he said, and 
since he could not be there to receive them, he had appointed an agent 
to supervise them and prevent overlapping locations. He also ap¬ 
pointed Josiah H. Bell, one of his former associates in Arkansas, to 
exercise temporarily in the settlement the duties of a justice of the 
peace. He found at Natchitoches nearly a hundred letters from Mis¬ 
souri, Kentucky, and other western states, and was convinced that 
he could settle fifteen hundred families as easily as three hundred. 
Since Martinez desired the rapid settlement of the province, Austin 
proposed a plan which he thought would bring this about. Let the 
government appoint a commissioner, or superintendent, of immigra¬ 
tion who knew conditions in the United States and the character of 
its inhabitants, as well as the quality and situation of the lands in 
Texas—himself in short—and a surveyor general, who, though inde¬ 
pendent of the commissioner, would act only on certificates furnished 
by him, and leave to these two officials the administration of such 
colonization regulations as the government might wish to pre¬ 
scribe. The distance to San Antonio, the expense of the journey, 
and the uncertainty and difficulty of dealing with the govern- 


68 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ment in a language which they did not understand would deter 
the best class of immigrants from risking the venture. His proposal 
would meet this difficulty, and would at the same time be a 
convenient one for the government, which would have to deal only 
with the commissioner and the surveyor. The commissioner • 
and presumably his colleague as well—should be authorized to exact 
from each settler a sufficient per cent on the land granted to compen¬ 
sate him for his trouble and expense in attending to the business. 
Martinez approved the plan and recommended to his superior its 
adoption and the appointment of Austin, “because he is a subject 
already known and who during his stay in this city gave the impres¬ 
sion of being a man of high honor, of scrupulous regard for formality, 
and of desiring to learn how to discharge faithfully the duties proposed 
by his late father.” As we shall see, however, the recommendation 
was rejected. 

Two permits to settle in his colony that Austin issued while at 
Natchitoches add certain details of his plan which do not appear in 
his letter to the governor. To Josiah H. Bell, who on October 6 
received a grant for himself, his wife, two sons, and three slaves 
according to the scale set forth in the letter to Martinez, Austin stipu¬ 
lated that the land must be occupied and cultivated within a year and 
that for the privilege of settling Bell should pay him $12.50 per hun¬ 
dred acres, half on receipt of title and the other half twelve months 
later. Austin obligated himself to obtain the title and to pay survey¬ 
ing charges and other fees. To William Kincheloe on the 16th he 
granted an extra six hundred and forty acres without payment of the 
twelve and a half cents an acre, in return for the erection of a mill. 
Thereafter it was a common practice, subsequently authorized by law, 
to augment grants in recognition of public service, and in proportion 
to ability to improve the land. 

By November 10 Austin was back in New Orleans to make his 
final arrangements. He bought a small vessel, the Lively, which 
Hawkins fitted out, and engaged a number of emigrants to sail to 
Texas, sound the coast from Galveston Island to the Guadalupe, land 
at the mouth of the Colorado, build a stockade, plant and cultivate 
five acres of corn, and remain in his service until December, 1822, 
when he would give each of them six hundred and forty acres of land 
and half the yield of his crop. In the meantime, he agreed to furnish 
tools and work animals and to pay their living expenses while in his 
service. He signed with Hawkins a contract formalizing their pre¬ 
vious agreement, by which Hawkins pledged $4,000 to inaugurate the 
colony and Austin promised Hawkins half the land and other profits 
derived from the undertaking. He had already written from Goliad in 
August the substance of the terms which he proposed to allow settlers, 
and his letters, appearing in the newspapers of the Mississippi Valley, 
had aroused great interest. He now published his offer in final form. 


BEGINNINGS OF THE AMERICAN SETTLEMENT 69 


Settlers would receive the quantities of land indicated in his letter to 
Governor Martinez from Natchitoches—mechanics and men of capital 
being allowed additional land and privileges “in proportion to their 
capacity to be useful.” In return they must take the oath of allegiance 
to the Mexican government, pay Austin twelve and a half cents an 
acre for the land, which he would deliver free of all other fees and 
expenses, and settle and cultivate a part of the grant by January, 1823. 
Nobody would be admitted who did not “produce satisfactory evidence 
of having supported the character of a moral, sober, and industrious 
citizen.” In accordance with his instructions from Martinez, Austin 
signed himself Civil Commandant of the Colony. 

Details of the return to Texas are lacking. Austin probably left 
New Orleans on November 25. He was certainly back at Nacog¬ 
doches on December 17, whence, no doubt, he proceeded immediately 
to the interior. During his absence a few families had moved into 
his grant, but our information concerning them is very scant. Evi¬ 
dently few of the “fifty or more” families of whom he wrote to 
Martinez from Nacogdoches in October had moved. Toward the end 
of November four families were camped on the west bank of the 
Brazos at the crossing of the La Bahia road, near the present site of 
Washington. The first to arrive was Andrew Robinson’s; the others 
were those of three brothers, Abner, Joseph, and Robert Kuykendall. 
During December several other families joined them. About Christ- V 
mas Robert and Joseph Kuykendall and Daniel Gilleland proceeded 
along the La Bahia road to the crossing of the Colorado and planted 
the first settlement on that river, near the present Columbus. The 
other Kuykendall brother and Thomas Boatright moved a few days 
later some ten miles west of the Brazos, and on January 1 established 
a settlement on New Year’s Creek on land which they had previously 
explored. About the same time Josiah H. Bell settled on the Brazos 
some five miles below the La Bahia road. During January and Feb¬ 
ruary the movement into the colony was very brisk. This was natural, 
of course, because it was necessary to leave the United States after 
gathering one crop and arrive in Texas, while it was still a wilderness, 
in time to plant another. Of Austin’s own journey from Nacogdoches 
there is no record. He spent January and February searching for 
the party that the Lively was to land at the mouth of the Colorado, 
which, as it really landed at the Brazos, he did not find, and then he 
went to San Antonio to report to Governor Martinez. At the time 
of his departure, March 3, he said that there were fifty men on the 
Brazos and a hundred on the Colorado, building cabins and planting 
corn to be prepared for the coming of their families in the fall. He 
knew then of but eight families already arrived. 

For several months the fate of the Lively was a subject of grave 
anxiety to Austin. He went to San Antonio and then to Mexico City 
still fearing that the vessel was lost. Rumor spread among the early 


70 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


colonists and later crystallized into a tradition that the ship was lost, 
and Yoakum records in his History of Texas, published in 1856, that 
after sailing from New Orleans “she was never heard of more.” The 
essential facts in the history of the unfortunate little ship can be briefly 
told. It was of thirty tons burden and cost Austin $600, most of which 
was provided by a loan from Edward Lovelace, one of the men who 
had accompanied him in the exploration of the past summer. It sailed 
toward the end of November, laden as we know with tools, provisions, 
seed, and seventeen or eighteen emigrants, instructed to sound the 
Texas coast and land in the Colorado. On December 3 it sailed past 
the mouth of the Brazos, and on the 23d returned there and landed 
the cargo and passengers. What it had been doing in the meantime 
we do not know. It then sailed southward to make soundings, and 
at least some of those left behind expected it to return, but they never 
saw it again. Instead, it arrived in New Orleans some time prior to 
February 6, took on another cargo and more passengers, and return¬ 
ing was wrecked on the western shore of Galveston Island, with the 
total loss of the cargo. The passengers, among whom was Thomas 
M. Duke, were taken off the island by the schooner John Motley 
and landed at the mouth of the Colorado. The party on the Brazos, 
disappointed at not finding Austin, divided into two groups, one com¬ 
manded by Edward Lovelace and the other by William Little, both 
of whom knew something of the country through the exploration of 
the previous summer. While Lovelace pursued a vain search up 
stream for a settlement, Little remained below to watch the stores. 
When Lovelace returned, the reunited parties, living on game, tried 
to raise a crop of corn. The severe drought of 1822 defeated these 
efforts, and, finally discouraged, all but two or three drifted back to 
the United States. Though the history of the Lively was well known 
to the early settlers, Austin’s failure to find the first immigrants and 
the subsequent loss of the vessel became confused in the memory of 
later arrivals. This accounts for the legend of its mysterious disap¬ 
pearance with all on board. 

At San Antonio, fresh from the disappointment at the mouth of 
the Colorado, another shock awaited Austin. Martinez had acted with¬ 
out consulting his superior in recognizing him to succeed his father; 
and having personal knowledge of the wilderness condition of Texas, 
of the difficulties of travel and communication, and realizing that 
immigrants must have permanent grants immediately in order to build 
shelters for their families and plant food crops, without which they 
would surely starve, he approved, as we have seen, Austin’s schedule 
for distributing land and endorsed his suggestion for the appointment 
of an immigration commissioner. At Monterey, however, a hundred 
leagues to the south, the commandant general and the provincial depu¬ 
tation had no such conception of these practical problems, nor did they 
share the Texan executive’s eager desire for the improvement of his 


BEGINNINGS OF THE AMERICAN SETTLEMENT 71 


province. They replied, therefore, to Martinez’s report of what he had 
done that Austin must “not distribute lands, appoint judges, nor 
assume any authority whatever,” but that in all cases he should make 
known his wishes to the superior government (themselves) and await 
its decisions, and in the meantime the immigrants must be settled 
provisionally on land designated by the nearest ayuntamiento. 

At the same time the new government in Mexico had begun the 
consideration of a colonization policy for Texas and the Californias. 
Knowing the genius of his people for punctilio, Martinez could fore¬ 
see occasion for infinite inquiry and delay concerning Austin’s contract, 
and he advised him therefore to go to the capital and endeavor to get 
it confirmed. This was a totally unexpected and very distressing con¬ 
tingency. Besides feeling keen responsibility for the immigrants whom 
he had brought and was bringing to Texas and who it now appeared 
might suffer great delay in obtaining land, Austin’s financial resources 
were far too limited to undertake such a trip lightly. With little hesi¬ 
tation, however, he set out, after appointing Josiah H. Bell to assume 
general direction of the incoming colonists. His passport was issued 
by Martinez on March 13, it was vised at Monterey on April 10, and 
he arrived in the city on April 29. Between San Antonio and Mon¬ 
terey the Indians were a continual menace, and beyond Monterey the 
country swarmed with bandits. From San Antonio to Laredo he 
traveled with two companions, Dr. Robert Andrews and a man named 
Waters. Six miles west of the Nueces a band of fifty Comanches sur¬ 
rounded them and seized all their belongings, but upon learning that 
they were Americans released them and restored all their property 
except four blankets, a bridle, and—of all things—a Spanish grammar. 
At Laredo Austin thought it prudent to await the departure of a con¬ 
siderable company which was traveling his road to La Punta, but 
from Monterey southward he had but one companion, a veteran of 
Mina’s expedition going to Mexico to apply for a pension as a reward 
for service in the war for independence. 

From the Medina River to Laredo, Austin described the country 
as “the poorest I ever saw in my life, it is generally nothing but sand, 
entirely void of timber, covered with scrubby thorn bushes and prickly 
pear.” Laredo was “as poor as sand banks, and drought, and indo¬ 
lence can make it.” For the rest of the journey, no one, he thought, 
who had read Humboldt could travel through it without great dis¬ 
appointment. A country more miserable than that between Monterey 
and the capital he hoped did not exist anywhere else in the world— 
the Choctaw Indians lived in luxury in comparison. However, the 
country possessed great resources, and these combined with the enthu¬ 
siasm growing out of the successful struggle for independence and the 
general harmony which prevailed, offered, in his judgment, “pledges 
of future greatness and prosperity.” Of the capital he wrote after a 
residence of ten weeks: 


72 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


This city is a truly magnificent one, as regards the external appearance of the 
buildings, and altho I at first thought it not larger than New York, I now think 
after a better examination that it is larger than any city in the U. S. and much 
more populous. The population however is very much mixed and a great pro¬ 
portion of them are most miserably poor and wretched, beggars are more 
numerous than I ever saw in any place in my life—robberies are frequent in 
the streets—the people are bigotted and superstitious to an extreme, and indo¬ 
lence seems to be the order of the day. In fact the City, Magnificent as it is 
in appearance is at least one century behind many others in point of intelligence 
and improvements in the arts and the nation is generally in the same situation. 


CHAPTER VIII 


TERMS OF THE MEXICAN COLONIZATION LAWS 


[Stephen F. Austin arrived in Mexico City at the end of April, 1822, seek¬ 
ing confirmation of the permission that his father had received to settle three 
hundred families in Texas. Exactly a year later the government approved the 
grant and made a contract with Stephen F. Austin to settle the three hundred 
families. The government agreed to make each family a free gift of 4,605 
acres of land and to give Austin 99,630 acres for his services in settling the 
three hundred families. Austin was the only empresario who was granted a 
contract on such terms. ^ 

The two documents which follow show the terms upon which all other colo¬ 
nization contracts were made while Texas was subject to Mexico. 

The first document is the colonization law passed by the federal Congress 
on August 18, 1824. It lays down a few general provisions to which colonization 
contracts must conform and leaves details to the state legislatures. 

The second document sets forth the generous terms upon which foreign 
colonists might settle Texas. 

Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapter XIV; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A 
School History of Texas, 66-82; Barker, The Life of Stephen F. Austin, 
Chapter IV.] 


I. General Law of Colonization 
Dated i8th August, 1824 

The Sovereign General Congress, assembled for the purpose of 
framing the Constitution of the United Mexican States, has decreed 
as follows: 

Art. 1. The Mexican Nation offers to those foreigners who may 
be desirous of settling in her territory security for their persons and 
property, provided they obey the laws of the country. 

Art. 2. This law relates to those lands, national property, which, 
as belonging to no individual, corporation or town, may be occupied 
by settlers. 

Art 3. For this purpose the Congresses of the States shall as 
speedily as possible frame laws or regulations for the colonization of 
those lands which appertain to them, conforming in every respect with 
the fundamental constitutional Act, the General Constitution, and the 
regulations established by this law. 

Art. 4. No lands lying within 20 leagues of the boundaries with 
any foreign nation, nor within 10 leagues of the coast, can be occupied 
by settlers, without the previous approbation of the Supreme Executive 
Power. 


73 


74 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Art. 5. If, with a view to the defence or security of the nation, 
the government of the federation should think fit to occupy any of the 
lands, in order to construct magazines, arsenals, or other public build¬ 
ings, it is empowered so to do, with the approbation of the general 
Congress, and during its recess with that of the Council of Government. 

Art. 6. Until 4 years from the publication of this law, no impost 
shall be levied for the admission of those foreigners who may come for 
the first time, in order to settle in the nation. 

Art. 7. Until the year 1840 the general Congress shall not pro¬ 
hibit the admission of foreigners to colonize, excepting, indeed, cir¬ 
cumstances should imperiously oblige it so to do, with regard to the 
individuals of any nation. 

Art. 8. The Government, without defeating the purposes of this 
law, shall take those measures of precaution which it may deem expe¬ 
dient for the security of the federation, with regard to those foreigners 
who may come to colonise. 

Art. 9. In the distribution of lands a preference is to be given 
to Mexican citizens, and between them no other distinction shall be 
made than that to which individual merit, or services rendered to the 
country, may justify, or, where in other cases a parity exists, residence 
in the part to which the lands appertain. 

Art. 10. Those military men who, agreeably to the offer of the 
27th March, 1821, have a right to lands, shall be recompensed on pre¬ 
senting the documents with which the Supreme Executive Power shall 
for that purpose provide them. 

Art. 11. If, according to decrees for paying off the principal 
according to a calculation of the probability of the length of life of 
the incumbent, the Supreme Executive Power should think proper to 
alienate any portions of land in favour of any public servants of the 
federation, military or civil, it is empowered so to do, with the govern¬ 
ment lands of the territories of the Republic. 

Art. 12. In the possession of no individual shall be allowed to be 
united, as his own property, more than one square league of 5,000 yards 
of lands fit for irrigation, 4 of arable land not irrigated, and 6 of 
pasture land. 

Art. 13. The new settlers are not permitted to transfer their 
property to religious communities. 

Art. 14. This law guarantees the contracts which speculators 
[empresarios, or contractors] may make with those families which they 
may convey at their own expense, provided they are not contrary to 
the laws. 

Art. 15. No one who in virtue of this law obtains possession of 
lands, can hold them if settled out of the territory of the Republic. 

Art. 16. The government agreeably to the principles established 
in this law shall proceed to colonise the territories of the Republic. 

The Supreme Executive Power is hereby made acquainted with this 


TERMS OF MEXICAN COLONIZATION LAWS 75 


law, and will take the requisite measures for its fulfilment, directing 
that it be printed, published, and circulated.—Mexico, 18th Aug. 1824. 

II. Law for Promoting Colonization in the State of Coahuila 

and Texas 

Decree, No. 16. The Congress, assembled for the purpose of 
forming the Constitution of the Sovereign and Independent State of 
Coahuila and Texas, desirous of augmenting by all possible means the 
population of its territory ; of encouraging the cultivation of its fertile 
lands, the raising of stock, and the progress of arts and commerce, 
in exact conformity with the Act on which the Constitution is founded; 
with the federal Constitution; and the basis established by the Sover¬ 
eign Decree of the general Congress, No. 72; decree as follows: 

Law of Colonization of the State of Coahuila and Texas 

Art. 1. All those foreigners who in virtue of the general law 
of the 18th August, 1824, by which security for their property and 
persons is offered in all the territory of the Mexican Nation, may be 
desirous of establishing themselves in any of the towns of Coahuila 
and Texas, are hereby permitted; that the State invites and proposes 
to them so to do. 

Art. 2. Those who shall do so, far from being in any way 
molested, shall be secured by the local authorities of the above men¬ 
tioned towns; which shall allow them full liberty to engage in what¬ 
ever honest calling may suit them, as long as they duly obey the general 
laws of the nation, and the ordinances of the State. 

Art. 5. The foreigners of any nation and the native Mexicans 
may undertake to form new settlements on lands belonging to the 
nation . . . but the new settlers, who may demand admission into the 
nation, must prove, by certificate from the authorities of the place 
from whence they came, that they are Christians, and also the morality 
and propriety of their conduct. 

Art. 7. The government shall take care that no settlement be 
made within 20 leagues of the boundaries of the United States of 
North America, and 10 leagues along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, 
except such as shall obtain the sanction of the Supreme Government 
of the Union: for which purpose it shall forward to it every petition 
on that head, made by Mexicans or foreigners, adding to it whatever 
remarks it may deem expedient. 

Art. 8 . All projects for establishing colonies, on which one or 
more persons may offer to bring, at their own expense, 100 or more 
families, shall be presented to the government, which, if it finds them 
agreeable to the law, shall approve of them, and immediately mark 
out to the projectors [empresarios, or contractors] the lands which 
they are to occupy, and the number of years allowed them for pre- 


76 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


senting the number of families for which they have stipulated, under 
penalty of forfeiting the rights and benefits offered them in proportion 
to the number of families they shall omit to provide, and the grant 
shall be wholly annulled should they not present, at the least, ioo 
families. 

Art. 9. This law guarantees all contracts made between the pro¬ 
jectors [empresarios] and the families brought at their expense, inso¬ 
far as they are in conformity with its provisions. 

Art. 11. A square [league] of land, of which each side is one 
league of 5,000 yards, or, what is precisely the same, 25,000,000 yards 
of surface, shall be named a lot, and shall be considered as the unity 
in counting one, two, or more lots: thus, also, the unity in counting 
one, two, or more subdivisions [labors] shall be 1,000,000 yards of 
surface, or a square of 1,000 yards each side, which is the measure 
of one subdivision: the yard used in these measurements shall be three 
geometrical feet. 

Art. 12. Supposing the quantity of land above stated to be the 
unity, and a division of the land being made, when distributed into 
grazing lands and those adapted for tillage by means of irrigation, 
or not requiring irrigation;—This law grants to such proj ector or the 
projectors of plans for colonization, for each 100 families which they 
convey and establish in the State, 5 lots [leagues] of grazing land, 
and 5 subdivisions [labors], of which at least one-half shall be arable 
land, not requiring irrigation; but they shall only receive this premium 
for as many as 800 families, even if they should introduce a greater 
number; nor shall any fractional number, be it what it may, which 
does not amount to 100, give them a right to any recompense, even 
in proportion to its amount. 

Art. 13. If any one or more projectors shall, on account of the 
families they have conveyed, obtain, agreeably to the preceding article, 
more than 11 square leagues, the whole of the land shall be granted 
to them, but they shall be under the obligation of selling the surplus 
[the excess above eleven leagues] within 12 years; and should they 
neglect to do so, the proper civil authorities shall do it, selling it at 
public auction, and delivering to them the net proceeds, after deduct¬ 
ing all the expenses attending the sale. 

Art. 14. To each of the families included in a project of colo¬ 
nization, whose sole occupation is the cultivation of the land, one divi¬ 
sion [labor] of land shall be given; should it also breed cattle, it shall 
receive also of grazing land a sufficient quantity to complete one lot 
[league] ; and if it only breeds cattle, it shall have of grazing land an 
extent of 24,000,000 superficial yards [that is, a league less one labor]. 

Art. 15. Bachelors shall on marrying obtain a similar quantity, 
and those foreigners who marry Mexican women shall have one-fourth 
more; but all those who are alone [unmarried] or forming a part of 
no family, whether they are Mexicans or foreigners, must content 


TERMS OF MEXICAN COLONIZATION LAWS 


77 


themselves with one-fourth part of the above-mentioned portions, nor 
will any greater quantity be allowed to them, and the allotments will 
be assigned to them in this proportion. 

Art. 16. The families, and single men, who having performed 
the journey at their own expense may wish to join any of the new 
settlements, shall be permitted to do so at any time; and their assign¬ 
ments of lands shall be to each individual the same as those mentioned 
in the preceeding articles; but if they do so within the first 6 years 
of the establishment of the colony, one more subdivision [labor] shall 
be given to each family, and each bachelor, in lieu of the one-fourth 
which the 15th Article designates, shall receive one-third part. 

Art. 17. The government is empowered to augment the assign¬ 
ment mentioned in the 14th, 15th, and 16th Articles, in proportion to 
the number of persons in each family, and to the industry and activity 
of the colonists, in conformity with the information relative to those 
points conveyed by the municipal authorities and the commissioners; 
but the government must always bear in mind the purport of the 12th 
Article of the decree of the General Congress on this point. 

Art. 22. The new colonist shall, as a species of acknowledgment, 
pay to the State for each lot [league] of pasture land, 30 dollars; 2 j 4 
for each subdivision [labor] of arable land not irrigated, and 3J/2 
dollars for each one [labor] of irrigated land, each in proportion to 
the kind and quantity of land which has been allotted to him; but the 
payment of those sums shall not be made in less than 6 years after 
their settlement, and in 3 equal instalments, the first at the expiration 
of the fourth; the others at the expiration of the fifth and sixth 
years, under penalty of forfeiting their lands should they neglect the 
payment of any one of these instalments. . . . 

Art. 26. It shall be considered that the many settlers who within 
6 years from the date of their grant have not cultivated or occupied 
according to its quality the land which has been granted to them, have 
renounced their rights, and the proper civil authority shall resume the 
grant and the title deeds. 

Art. 31. Those foreigners who agreeably to this law have 
obtained lands, and established themselves in these settlements, are 
considered from that moment as naturalized in the country, and should 
they marry Mexican women will be considered to have established a 
meritorious claim to obtain the rights of citizenship of the State, 
except, however, in both instances the cases provided for by the enact¬ 
ments of the Constitution of the State. 

Art. 32. During the first 10 years, counting from the day in 
which settlements are .established, they shall be free from every con¬ 
tribution [tax] under whatever denomination, excepting such as in 
the event of the invasion of an enemy or in order to prevent it every 
citizen is subjected to, and the produce and effects of the agriculture, 
and industry of the new settlers shall neither pay a duty on transit 


78 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


or sale in the markets, nor any other kind of impost in any part of 
the State, excepting indeed, the dues referred to in the following 
Article. At the expiration of the above-mentioned period the new 
settlements shall bear the same imposts as the old settlements, and the 
colonists those paid by the other inhabitants of the State. 

Art. 33. From the very day of their establishment the new set¬ 
tlers shall be at liberty to pursue every branch of industry, as well 
as to work mines of every description, previously coming to an agree¬ 
ment with the Supreme Government of the Federation relative to 
those which belong to the general revenues of the nation, subjecting 
themselves in the working of the others to the ordinances and laws 
already established, or which may hereafter be established on this 
subject. 

Art. 34. The towns shall be founded on the spots deemed by 
the government, or the person it names for that purpose, most fitting, 
and for each of them four leagues square shall be designated, which 
space shall be either of a regular or irregular shape, according to 
the locality. 

Art. 45. The government, agreeably to an arrangement with the 
proper ecclesiastical authorities, shall see that the new towns are 
provided with a proper number of clergy, and agreeably to an arrange¬ 
ment with the aforesaid authorities, shall propose to the Congress the 
salary which the new settlers are to pay them. 

Art. 46. As regards the introduction of slaves, the new settlers 
shall obey the laws already established, and which hereafter may be 
established on the subject. 


CHAPTER IX 


THE POWERS AND DUTIES OF AN EMPRESARIO 

By Stephen F. Austin 

[This letter, written by Stephen F. Austin, is an excellent statement of the 
legal powers and duties of an empresario. It was written to James W. Breed¬ 
love of New Orleans. It gives some account also of the fraudulent speculation 
in Texas land that some companies carried on in the United States. In con¬ 
nection with this selection read Barker, The Life of Stephen F. Austin, 298-300. 
The selection is from The Austin Papers, II, 264-271.] 

Austin’s Colony, Texas, 
October 12, 1829. 

Sir: 

I thank you for your kind disposition manifested in your letter 
to Mr. Williams towards this settlement; and in reply to your sug¬ 
gestion relative to the acquisition of land here, I deem it my duty 
to explain to you, somewhat in detail the nature of the colonization 
law, the authority given to the “Empresarios,” and also the nature 
of the authority under which I have acted. This subject is not 
understood in the United States, and the consequence has been, that 
some persons have been greatly deceived, and even this Government 
has been most unjustly slandered and abused for exercising the powers 
and doing what it is by law compelled to do. 

You are no doubt informed that the person who contracts with 
the Government to introduce families, or as it is commonly termed, 
settle a colony, is called in the law empresario. By explaining to you 
what an empresario is, you will understand this matter, and see that 
such projects, as published by Dennis A. Smith of Baltimore are 
totally incompatible with the authority given to Exter and Wilson 
and Company, for they are nothing more than empresarios. 

The empresario is an agent who is hired by the Government to 
introduce a specific number of families of a certain description within 
a certain time, who are to be settled within certain designated limits. 
Should the empresario introduce the families, and should they be 
received by the Government Commissioner as being of the descrip¬ 
tion required, then, and not before, the empresario is entitled to receive 
his pay, which is five leagues of land for each hundred families so 
introduced by him. 

The titles for land are all issued by the Government Commissioner, 

79 


80 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


who is especially appointed for that purpose, and he alone has the 
power to survey or appoint surveyors to survey the land, and to put 
settlers in possession and no one, under any circumstances, can hold 
land unless he first removes to the country and becomes an actual and 
permanent settler: neither can a foreigner hold real estate at all; and 
should a person who has lived hard all his life, and who has a good 
title, sell his land to a foreigner, the whole of the property thus sold 
becomes public by escheating to the Government the moment such 
sale is made. 

The empresario has no power nor shadow of power of any kind 
or description whatsoever, except to bring in the families. He is 
nothing but an agent for that express purpose; and like all other 
agents, he is liable to be dismissed by his employer for malpractices 
or neglect of duty. He is not entitled to one foot of land until he 
has complied with the conditions on which he was to get it; he has 
no claim to nor any right to dispose of one foot of land in any manner 
whatsoever (except his premium land and that only after he has 
received his title as above stated), and all the land that remains vacant 
within the limits assigned to the new Colony or settlement, after the 
specified number of families are settled, is public land and belongs to 
the Government, and not to the empresario, as some of them have 
pretended to claim. 

It is truly astonishing to see to what extent this subject has been 
misunderstood. We see an empresario advertising in the public papers 
the sale of 48,000,000 of acres of land as though it was his own 
individual property, when, in fact, he has no more right to dispose 
of one foot of it than you have. This error has perhaps arisen from 
the want of correct knowledge of the Spanish language, which has 
caused the law to be misunderstood—but the misfortune is that inno¬ 
cent persons are misled, and the Mexican Government unjustly 
slandered: 

I have no doubt that the contract of Exter, Wilson and Company 
will be annulled by the Government; for Edwards’ contract was annulled 
for a similar reason, added to others, and the agency or empresarior- 
ship taken from him. If that is done, those men to justify themselves, 
will in all probability lay the blame on the Government and complain 
that they have been robbed of 48,000,000 acres of land. 

All this is very unjust, and it is important that public opinion 
should be disabused in regard to it. I am, however, entirely unwill¬ 
ing that my name should appear in the public papers in any manner 
connected with this matter. I have heretofore given frank and honest 
advice to persons on this same subject, and have never yet failed to 
make an enemy by doing so, for the reason that they knew better than 
I did. I have interfered with none. But notwithstanding my caution 
in this respect, I have not escaped jealousy and censure. You know 
the character of North-Americans, they are taught from their infancy 


POWERS AND DUTIES OF AN EMPRESARIO 


81 


to look upon all who are in office with jealousy and suspicion; and, 
in general, they always attribute corruption to what they do not 
clearly undertsand. The information contained in this letter is given 
to you in reply to a friendly suggestion made by you from kind and 
friendly motives. I saw that you did not comprehend the matter, and 
I deemed it a duty to lay it before you as it really is. 

In order that you may more fully understand this subject, it is 
necessary that I should give you a sketch of the authority under 
which I have acted in the settlement of my first Colony. You will 
perceive that it was of an entirely different character from that which 
is or can be given under the present law. The application to settle 
three hundred families from the United States in Texas, was origi¬ 
nally made by my father Moses Austin to the Spanish authorities in 
1820 and was granted in January, 1821, about one month before the 
grito de Iguala or the revolution of Iturbide. 

My father died in Missouri in the spring of 1821, a few days after 
he heard that his petition had been granted, and left as a last request 
that I should prosecute the enterprise. I came on to this country in 
the summer of 1821, and spent four months in exploring it and com¬ 
pleting such arrangements as were deemed by the Government of 
Texas to be sufficient for me to progress with the settlement. These 
arrangements were all made through an interpreter, for at that time 
I did not understand one word of Spanish. 

In the winter of ’21-22, I arrived on the Brazos with the first 
families—about 40, and after getting them arranged to their satisfac¬ 
tion, I went to Bexar to report to the Governor. On my arrival there 
in March he informed me that I must go to the City of Mexico and 
procure confirmation of my authority from the National Congress 
which convened in February, 1822. This was unexpected and rather 
discouraging, for the families were in an entire wilderness and my 
presence was highly necessary. I started, however, to Mexico and 
arrived there in April. 

The various revolutions and political changes of the eventful 
years 1822 and 1823 detained me in that city one year before my 
affairs were finally dispatched. Previous to the fall of Iturbide my 
business was completed, and I received all the necessary documents, 
but not until I became convinced by the state of parties and public 
sentiment that the Emperor must soon fall; and I feared that in such 
an event a doubt might hang over the legality of his acts and those 
of the Junta Instituyente under whose enactments my business was 
dispatched. I therefore waited until he did fall and was dethroned 
and the National Congress reinstated. I then presented the documents 
which I received from the Imperial Government, and petitioned Con¬ 
gress to confirm them or do with them as that body might esteem 
proper. On the nth of April, 1823, Congress passed a decree author¬ 
izing the Supreme Executive power to confirm them; and on the 


82 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


14th of that month the Executive did confirm them in due form and 
return them to me. I then left that city for Texas. 

I give this narrative to show how and whence my authority ema¬ 
nated. You will understand that at that time the Government of this 
nation was consolidated. The Federal system was not adopted and 
the State Governments established until about one year afterwards. 

The authority given to me was to introduce and settle three hun¬ 
dred families from the United States or elsewhere, in certain limits 
of Texas. The Baron de Bastrop and myself were jointly appointed 
the Government commissioners to survey the lands of the settlers and 
issue titles to them in due form in the name of the Government. We 
were specially authorized to increase the quantity of land over one 
league to any settler, who, in our opinion, was entitled to such an 
increase, either by the capital which he introduced into the country 
or by the size of his family, and there were no limits fixed as to the 
extent to which we might go in making such increase of quantity. 

We were entitled as commissioners to receive fees or pay for our 
services, and the necessary office fees and charges for writing, trans¬ 
lating and recording, and also the surveying fees, all of which were 
fixed by a regulation of the Government of Texas, and were, or ought 
to have been paid by the settlers; for the Government allowed us 
nothing for our services. 

I was therefore both empresario and commissioner to my first 
Colony. Besides this, I was specially appointed by the Supreme Gov¬ 
ernment of Mexico to be the Civil Chief, the sole judicial officer, and 
the commandant of the militia of the new Colony, subject always to the 
orders of the Government of Texas, and the Commandant-General of 
the military department, but for these services I received nothing 
from the Government. 

These several appointments (for they were all separate and dis¬ 
tinct the one from the other) threw a vast burden of labor and respon¬ 
sibility and expense upon me individually—an expense and labor which 
I was not bound by my contract as empresario to bear. What ren¬ 
dered my situation still more troublesome and perplexing, was that 
the Government at that time was unsettled and shaken by frequent 
political revolutions and changes of systems, policy and officers, and 
I had to make new friends and acquaintances amongst the superior 
powers at every change. Added to all this, out of my office, there was 
not one person in the settlement who could correctly translate any 
law or order of the Government. I was from necessity the sole organ 
of communication with the Government; and as respects the local 
government of the settlement, the granting of lands, etc., etc., it ap¬ 
peared to the settlers that my authority was absolute. 

It is sufficient for me to say that my settlers were North Amer¬ 
icans, and many of them frontiersmen who had never known 
restraint, to inform you that I was looked upon with jealousy and 


POWERS AND DUTIES OF AN EMPRESARIO 


83 


suspicion. It was the natural result of the national character of those 
people, and of the situation in which circumstance and necessity, and 
even the salvation of the settlement had placed me—and that situa¬ 
tion also imposed upon me the duty and difficult task of bearing in 
silence and good humor, all the abuse and jealousy that ignorance 
and suspicion could heap upon me, leaving it to time to test my acts 
and prove whether they were correct or not. It has done so, and all 
are satisfied with me except a few. 

I do assure you that it was a difficult task, and I may frankly 
confess that I would have abandoned the settlement, the settlers and 
the country, if no other motive than pecuniary individual interest 
had influenced me. My ambition was to be the means of laying a 
foundation for spreading an intelligent and an enterprising popu¬ 
lation over this fertile and hitherto unknown and wilderness country. 
Perhaps, also, I had a little pride in wishing to succeed, for I under¬ 
took this enterprise in opposition to the advice of my friends in the 
United States, who nearly all pronounced it visionary and imprac¬ 
ticable. 

You must pardon my egotism in speaking so much of myself, but 
the history of this settlement is so closely connected with me indi¬ 
vidually, that one cannot be clearly explained without allusion to the 
other, and beside it seems to account in part for some of the erroneous 
opinions that have spread as to powers of the empresario. Those 
who were ignorant of the language, or who would not or could not 
take the trouble of inquiring, supposed, or pretended to suppose, that 
I derived all my authority solely from being empresario, when, in 
fact, I held various distinct appointments, and those powers have been 
supposed to attach to the empresario, which in no respects whatever 
belong to him. Also, they have confounded the old National Coloniza¬ 
tion law of January 4th, 1823, which is no longer in force, with the 
present State law passed 25th of March, 1825. 

As I have before observed, my business was despatched by the 
National Government, 14th of April, 1823. About one year after¬ 
wards the State governments were established under the federal 
system, and on the 18th of August, 1824, the National Constitutional 
Congress (the same that formed the Federal Constitution, and was, 
in fact, the Convention), passed a law relinquishing to the States 
the territory within their respective limits, and authorizing each State 
to make its own Colonization law, with the restriction that not more 
than eleven leagues of land should be granted to any one individual, 
and also that the lands within ten leagues of the coast and twenty 
leagues of a line of an adjoining nation, should not be colonized or 
granted without the consent of the President of the nation. 

Under this authority the State of Coahuila and Texas passed the 
colonization law of March 24, 1825, which is now in force, and under 
which all the empresarios have been made, for my first Colony is 


84 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the only one that was ever granted under the law of the 4th of Janu¬ 
ary, 1823. In addition to my first Colony, I made three contracts 
with the State Government to settle 900 families in all, on the vacant 
land remaining within the limits designated for my first Colony. One 
of those contracts includes the land bordering on the coast, which was 
granted with the special approbation of the President as the law 
requires. Also, in one of said contracts (the one on the coast) I was 
appointed commissioner as well as empresario, and in virtue of these 
two distinct appointments, all the powers of both were centered in me. 
I am the only person in whom these two appointments ever have been 
united, although others have only looked at what I did without exam¬ 
ining my authority or attending to my advice; and have supposed that 
all empresarios could do the same. 

A General Commissioner has lately been appointed for the whole 
of Texas who will shortly be on here. I presume that his appoint¬ 
ment will supersede all other appointments of commissioners. Also 
a Surveyor-General has been appointed, who will be on with the 
General Commissioner. If you have not already procured the colo¬ 
nization law of this State I will send it to you as soon as it can be 
published in English in the Texas Gazette; and by comparing this 
statement with the law you will see that it is correct. It may be 
late in the winter before it is published for there are some other laws 
which it is highly important to get out in English before the elections 
in December, for owing to the want of a printing press it has hereto¬ 
fore been impossible to publish them. 

The colonization business is the last on earth that any man ought 
to undertake for the sole purpose of making money; and no empre¬ 
sario will ever advance one step if no other motive than money influ¬ 
ence him; for he will not undergo the labor and receive the abuse 
for all he can make—that is, he will not advance legally. 

No empresario ever had such an opportunity of making a fortune 
by imposing on the ignorance and credulity of capitalists in other 
countries as I have had, for no one of them ever had the power 
that I had; but instead of leaving my settlers to shift for themselves, 
and instead of distorting the law to mislead others and benefit myself, 
I have remained here and shared the toils of settling a wilderness, 
and have rigidly adhered to the law and my duty to this Government. 
And I have also succeeded in laying a permanent foundation for the 
settlement of Texas by an enterprising population, and the day is not 
far distant when it will become the richest and most powerful State 
of the Mexican Confederation. 

But I am poor. I have not even the means of living with com¬ 
fort and that decency which my situation would seem to require, unless 
I raise those means by a sacrifice of a part of my premium land so 
hardly earned, and that I will not do for it is my only stake for my 
old age. 


POWERS AND DUTIES OF AN EMPRESARIO 


85 


Will it not appear strange to you that although such is my real 
situation an opinion has gone abroad that I have made myself rich 
by what I received from the settlers, or rather by selling land to 
them, as the uninformed and ignorant have styled the fees which I 
was by law entitled to as Commissioner, and for surveying, etc, etc.? 
Strange as it may seem, it is nevertheless a fact. The majority of 
the settlers were unable to pay anything, and must have left the 
country if the fees had been exacted from them promptly. In order 
to keep all afloat I did exact prompt payment from those who were 
able to make it, and out of the money thus raised I paid the way of 
the poor who were unable to pay any thing. And I also defrayed 
the expenses of the administration of the local Government, and was 
enabled to keep the Indians friendly by presents and feeding them 
until we got strong enough to whip them into subjection. 

By this course of policy I have saved this settlement and brought 
it to what it now is, and have secured large-landed estates to hun¬ 
dreds of poor men who otherwise would not or could not ever have 
got one foot of land. Some of these men have never yet paid one 
cent, and accuse me of speculating and cheating them because I ask 
it of them. It is human nature and I do not complain. Besides it 
is my duty to bear these matters with patience, for it is a sacrifice 
that is due to the future prosperity and greatness of this favored 
country to bear with patience and perseverance all the labor and all 
the mortifications attendant upon the difficult task of laying the 
foundation of that prosperity. 

I have again become an egotist. Perhaps I am influenced by the 
idea that a man who labors faithfully to the best of his abilities and 
with pure intentions is entitled to some compensation, and that unless 
I derive one by getting a little credit for what I have done or tried 
to do, I shall come off badly, for I doubt very much whether I shall 
live to reap much advantage from my premium land, which as I 
before observed, is my only stake, and it is not free from embarrass¬ 
ments created solely for the benefit of this settlement. 

I have just recovered from a dangerous spell of sickness, and 
also I have to mourn the recent death of an only and beloved brother, 
and I am not in a situation to write connectedly on any subject; you 
must therefore overlook my style. I will be responsible for the facts 
which I have stated. 


Stephen F. Austin, 


CHAPTER X 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS FOR THE COLONIZA¬ 
TION OF TEXAS, 1825-1834 

By Mary Virginia Henderson 

[These extracts explain the workings of the colonization laws and list all 
the empresario contracts for the settlement of Texas except those of Austin, 
DeWitt, and Edwards. The boundaries of the empresario grants are given for 
those who wish to work them out on the map. The article from which these 
selections are made is published in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, 
XXXI, 295-324, XXXII, 1. For Austin’s colonies see Barker, The Life of 
Stephen F. Austin, Chapters V-VI; for the ill-fated Edwards colony see 
the same work, Chapter VII; for DeWitt’s colony the article by Ethel Zivley 
Rather in the Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, VIII, 95- 
192. Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapter XIV; Barker, The Life of Stephen F. 
Austin, Chapter VI.] 

Mexico’s preparation for the colonization of Texas .—The estab¬ 
lishment of an independent government in Mexico marks the begin¬ 
ning of a new era in the history of Texas, an era in which the 
suspicion and hostility of Spain toward all foreigners, and especially 
all citizens of the United States, was to be superseded by an invitation 
to the world to build homes within Mexico’s vast wildernesses. When 
Spain controlled the territory, foreigners found without passports 
were thrown into prison where they might remain many weary years. 

With the establishment of Mexican authority over Texas, the 
attitude toward foreigners was very different. As expressed in the 
colonization law of the State of Coahuila and Texas, it was “the 
state invites and calls them.” 

Many answered the call, some as empresarios and others as 
colonists. The purpose of this paper is to give, wherever possible, a 
brief account of the work done by the minor empresarios of the period 
from 1825 to 1834. The better known empresarios, Stephen F. Austin, 
Green DeWitt and Haden Edwards, will not be included. 

To understand the work of the empresarios, it will be necessary 
to examine some of the provisions of the colonization laws of Mexico 
and of the State of Coahuila and Texas. Mexico passed her first 
colonization law in January, 1823, while Iturbide was emperor. With 
his overthrow in March, 1823, and the repeal of the colonization law 
of 1823, it was then necessary for the Mexican Republic to formulate 
its colonization policy. On August 18, 1824, the central government 

86 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS 


87 


passed the national colonization law. This laid down a few general 
regulations with reference to colonization within the nation, but left 
the undertaking largely to the states. In the first place each state was to 
pass a colonization law for the settlement of the unoccupied territory 
within its limits. However, only the federal government could grant per¬ 
mission to establish settlements within twenty leagues of the boundary 
of any foreign nation or within ten leagues of the coast. Other pro¬ 
visions were that no person could hold more than eleven leagues of 
land. A preference was to be given in the distribution of land to 
Mexican citizens, but no other discriminations were to be shown except 
for individual merit or services rendered the country or under equal 
circumstances to the person who lived in the place where the land 
was located. It was not possible for any person who acquired land 
by virtue of the law of August 18, 1824, to hold that land if he lived 
outside of the Mexican Republic. An especially significant provision 
of the law occurred in Article 7: 

Until after the year 1840, the general congress shall not prohibit the entrance 
of any foreigner as a colonist, unless imperious circumstances should require 
it with respect to the individuals of a particular nation. 

Mexico seemed to realize that “imperious circumstances’' might 
arise. If they should, that is, if the immigrants from any particular 
nation seemed to be too numerous, or lacking in loyalty to Mexico, 
she could forbid their further entrance with ease. The same law 
which gave immigrants permission to enter would guarantee to her 
the right to close her gates to them whenever she considered it ex¬ 
pedient. The colonist at the time of his entrance into Texas seemed 
so eager to try his fortune in the state, that he scarcely noticed, 
and perhaps did not notice at all, that provision of the law. However, 
when Mexico took advantage of the provision and passed the law 
of April 6, 1830, by which she forbade the further entrance of cit¬ 
izens of the United States into Texas, the colonists then protested 
vigorously. Some declared Mexico had no right to pass the law. 
Mexico had, though, made her position secure when she included 
Article 7 in the national colonization law. The significance of the 
law of April 6, 1830, will be seen later in the history of the coloniza¬ 
tion contracts. 

In accordance with the national decree of August 18, 1824, the 
Legislature of Coahuila and Texas on March 24, 1825, passed its 
colonization law. As has been said, the state invited foreigners to 
make their homes on its unoccupied lands. All colonists had to 
“prove their Christianity, morality, and good habits by a certificate 
from the authorities where they formerly resided.” No commissioner 
could issue titles to land for a colonist until he received a written 
statement from the empresario approving the petition of the settler 
for land and thereby declaring his character satisfactory. The em- 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


presario, in most cases, accepted the certificate from the authorities of 
the immigrant’s past place of residence as satisfactory evidence of 
moral character. 

The state colonization law granted to each married man who 
wanted to farm one labor, an equivalent of 177 acres. If he also de¬ 
sired to raise cattle, he could obtain twenty-four labors of pasture 
land or 4,251 acres. The total of farming and pasture land 
made one sitio or league, consisting of 4,428 acres. An unmar¬ 
ried man received one-fourth of this amount. If the colonist’s 
occupation or capital was such that it would benefit the colony, he 
could obtain additional land. 

The new settler was required within six years to pay a nominal 
sum to the state for his land. For each sitio of pasture land he paid 
$30; for each labor of unirrigable land $2.50; and for each labor which 
was irrigable he paid $3.50. The government required no part of it 
to be paid until the end of four years. At the close of the fourth 
year one-third of the amount was due; at the end of the fifth year, 
another third; and when the sixth year closed, the last payment was 
to be made to the state. To acquire a title to his land the colonist had 
to occupy or cultivate it. 

The law extended the empresario or contractor system, which 
had been provided for in the national law. Each empresario made 
an agreement with the state to introduce a certain number of fam¬ 
ilies within six years. He received a definite area in which to locate 
his immigrants. Often his territory was spoken of as his grant. The 
use of the term was misleading. It led people unacquainted with the 
colonization laws to believe that all the land within the grant be¬ 
longed to the empresario to dispose of as he desired. In reality the 
land was only allotted to the empresario to settle with colonists. At 
first he did not own one acre of it. Although he would eventually 
receive a premium in land for each one hundred families introduced, 
no premium was due until he had located at least a hundred families. 
The premium consisted of five leagues and five labors for each hun¬ 
dred families settled on his grant. 

No empresario was permitted to receive a premium for more 
than eight hundred families. Since, however, the maximum premium 
an empresario might obtain was more than the eleven league limit 
fixed by the federal law, he had to alienate the excess within twelve 
years. 

The state law repeated the restriction of the federal law with 
reference to grants within twenty leagues of the boundary of any 
foreign nation or within ten leagues of the coast. 

It was under the national law of August 18, 1824, and the state 
law of March 24, 1825, that most of the empresario contracts were 
made for the colonization of Texas. Even before the federal colo¬ 
nization law was passed, there were men in Mexico City who were 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS 


89 


trying to obtain empresario contracts. Among them were Haden 
Edwards, Green DeWitt, Frost Thorn, and General James Wilkinson. 
Stephen F. Austin was also there, but for the purpose of having his 
father’s grant confirmed. With the promulgation of the national law 
making it necessary for each state to pass a colonization law, those 
who were endeavoring to obtain contracts transferred their attention 
to Saltillo, the capital of Coahuila and Texas. In less than a month 
after the passage of the state law and in one day’s time, the Governor 
of Coahuila and Texas contracted for the introduction of 2,400 
families. On April 15, 1825, Haden Edwards and Robert Leftwich 
each contracted to introduce 800 families. On the same day Green 
DeWitt and Frost Thorn each made contracts for 400 families. 

Other contracts made under the state law of March 24, 1825, 
were as follows: Martin de Leon, October 6, 1825, to settle 41 fam¬ 
ilies; John G. Purnell and Benjamin Drake Lovell, October 22, 1825, 
for 200 families; Benjamin R. Milam, January 12, 1826, for 300 
families; General Arthur G. Wavell, March 9, 1826, for 400 families; 
Stephen J. Wilson, May 27, 1826, for 200 families; John L. Wood¬ 
bury and Joseph Vehlein and Company, November 14, 1826, for 200 
families; Joseph Vehlein and Company, December 21, 1826, for 300 
families; David G. Burnet, December 22, 1826, for 300 families; John 
Cameron, May 21, 1827, for 100 families; John Cameron, February 
19, 1828, for 200 families; Richard Exeter and Stephen J. Wilson, 
February 23, 1828, for 100 families; James Hewetson and James 
Power, June 11, 1828, for 200 families; John McMullen and James 
McGloin, August 17, 1828, for 200 families; Joseph Vehlein and Com¬ 
pany, November 17, 1828, for 100 families; Lorenzo de Zavala, 
March 12, 1829, for 500 families; Martin de Leon, April 30, 
1829, for 150 familes; Colonel Juan Dominguez, February 6, 
1829, for 200 families; Juan Antonio Padilla and Thomas J. Cham¬ 
bers, February 12, 1830, for 800 families; General Vicente Filisola, 
October 15, 1831, for 600 families; and J. C. Beales and Jose Manuel 
Royuela, March 14, 1832, for 200 families. Beales and Royuela’s 
grant was the last under the law of March 24, 1825. 

By 1832 Mexico, which had grown suspicious of the Anglo-Ameri¬ 
cans and had begun to doubt the wisdom of the policy of colonization, 
saw its opportunity and attempted to seize it. Some of the empresario 
contracts had expired and others were expiring without the empre- 
sario’s having fulfilled them; the vacant land was therefore back in 
the possession of the government. Coahuila and Texas could then 
dispose of it as its Congress saw fit. The legislature passed a law, 
April 28, 1832, offering special protection and aid to Mexicans who 
should agree to settle on vacant lands in Texas, and making induce¬ 
ments to empresarios contracting to colonize with Mexicans or for¬ 
eigners not excluded by the law of April 6, 1830. By May 1 the state 
had made a contract with Juan Vicente Campos, the agent for a 


90 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Mexican company, composed of Mariano Dominguez, Fortunato Soto, 
Juan Ramon Mila de la Rosa, and John Charles Beales to introduce 
450 families; and on October 9, 1832, a contract was made with John 
Charles Beales and James Grant to introduce 800 families. Although 
Beales and Royuela’s grant was the last under the law of March 24, 
1825, the grant to Beales and Grant, being under the law of April 28, 
1832, seems to have been the last made by the government of Coahuila 
and Texas according to the records at my disposal. 

If it had been possible to settle the number of families designated 
by the contracts, Texas would soon have boasted of a fairly numerous 
population. Besides the Austin grants, contracts approved in 1825 
called for 2,641 families, in 1826 for 1,700, in 1827 for 100, in 1828 
for 800, in 1829 for 850, in 1830 for 800, in 1831 for 600, and in 
1832 for 1,450. However, Texas did not increase in population, as 
a result of the colonization laws, as rapidly as might have been ex¬ 
pected from the long array of contracts. Stephen F. Austin, who 
fulfilled several of his contracts, was the outstandingly successful 
empresario. Next to Austin in point of success was Green DeWitt. 
Others, as De Leon, McMullen and McGloin, Robertson (who was 
the successor of the Nashville Company), Milam, Hewetson and 
Power, and Zavala, Burnet and Vehlein (the Galveston Bay and 
Texas Land Company) did actually establish some colonists perma¬ 
nently on their grants. There were still others who either made no 
permanent settlements of colonists or who made no attempt to fulfill 
their contracts, as Wavell, Wilson, Wilson and Exeter, Woodbury, 
Cameron, Dominguez, Filisola, Padilla and Chambers, Thorn, Purnell 
and Lovell, Beales and Royuela, and Campos for the Mexican Com¬ 
pany, and Beales and Grant. 

The provisions of the contracts practically all followed the same 
general outline. At the beginning of the contract the government 
stated that it admitted the petitioner’s proposal to colonize vacant 
lands “in so far as it is conformable with the colonization laws.” The 
provisions were then stated, the usual ones being as follows: 

1. A statement of the boundaries of the proposed colony. 

2. That the empresario should respect the possession of lands 
which were already occupied under legal title. 

3. That the empresario should introduce the required number of 
families within six years or forfeit all rights and privileges granted 
to him by the law of March 24, 1825. 

4. That the families were to be of the Catholic religion and of 
good moral character. 

5. That the introduction of criminals was not allowed. If any 
should appear, they were to be ejected. 

6. That the empresario should organize a national militia force 
and command it unless otherwise ordered. 

7. That when the empresario had introduced one hundred fam- 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS 


91 


ilies, he should notify the government in order that a commissioner 
might be sent to give the colonists possession of the land. 

8. That all official communications with the government and all 
public acts and documents were to be written in Spanish. 

9. Contracts made after April 6, 1830, contained the restriction 
that no immigrants from adjoining countries were to be allowed to 
settle. 

In several of the contracts appeared the admonition to the em- 
presario to prevent all persons from bartering arms and ammunition 
with the Indians for horses and mules. 

Two groups of empresarios .—The empresarios, the guiding spirits 
in the colonization of Texas, fell into two groups. The first of the 
groups consisted of men who through their own efforts, or the efforts 
of others, really accomplished something toward the settlement of 
their grants. They were not notably successful, as was Stephen F. 
Austin; but they were instrumental in locating a number of families 
permanently, and thereby aided in bringing civilization to Texas. 
Such men were Burnet, Zavala, Vehlein, Robertson of the Nashville 
Company, Milam, McMullen, McGloin, Hewetson, Power, and De 
Leon. The second group included the empresarios who obtained 
contracts from the government, but who, either because of the lack 
of initiative and judgment, or because of shortage of capital, were 
unable to make any contribution to the settlement of the state. 

Efforts toward colonization by the first group were in three dis¬ 
tinct sections of Texas. The grants of Burnet, Zavala, and Vehlein 
formed a compact area in East Texas between the San Jacinto and 
Sabine rivers. Robertson’s and Milam’s grants lay in central Texas 
northwest of Austin’s colonies. On the coast to the south were De 
Leon’s and Power and Hewetson’s grants; adjoining Power and 
Hewetson and to the northwest lay McMullen and McGloin’s grant. 

Boundaries of Empresario Grants 
[To be used for map work if desired.] 

Burnet, Zavala, and Vehlein .—The first three grants mentioned, 
those of Burnet, Zavala, and Vehlein, lying in East Texas, were not 
only united geographically, but were later united for colonization pur¬ 
poses in one company and followed the same history. In December, 
1826, David G. Burnet, originally of New Jersey, had obtained a 
grant to settle three hundred families within the following boundaries: 

Beginning at the Town of Nacogdoches: Thence on a North course, the 
distance of fifteen leagues, to a point clear of the Twenty boundary leagues, 
parallel with the river Sabine, which River, is the boundary or dividing line 
with the United States of the North, here a land mark shall be made, and 
thence a line run West to Navasoto Creek: Thence down said creek, with its 
meanderings by its left bank to the place where it is crossed by the road lead- 


92 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ing from Bexar to Nacogdoches: Thence with said road, to fork of the Bull’s 
hill road (“Loma del Toro”) before arriving at the Military Post on the 
Trinity, with said road to its junction with the old road, and with said old 
road to the Town, Nacogdoches, and place of beginning. Leaving on the right 
all the land granted yesterday to Citizen John Lucius Woodbury Attorney for 
Vehlein and company. 

Joseph Vehlein, a German merchant of Mexico City, through his 
agent, John L. Woodbury, made his first contract with the govern¬ 
ment for three hundred families in December, 1826, to be settled with 
the following boundaries: 

Beginning at the Town of Nacogdoches: Thence South, leaving free 
Twenty boundary border leagues, parallel with the Sabine River to the inter¬ 
section of the boundary line of the same, with that of the Ten coast border 
leagues, on the Gulf of Mexico. Thence west to the river San Jacinto: Thence 
up the said river with its left bank, to its source, and thence on a straight line 
North to the San Antonio road leading from Bexar to Nacogdoches: Thence 
with said road to the town aforesaid, and previous to arriving at the River 
Trinity the line shall follow the road called Bull’s hill road (Loma del Toro) 
crossing that river above the Military Post, and continuing on said road, until 
it unites with the road first mentioned and thence with it to the Town of 
Nacogdoches and place of beginning. 

Burnet’s grant and Vehlein’s first grant covered a large part of 
the territory previously granted to Haden Edwards, whose contract 
had just been annulled by the state. Joseph Vehlein in 1828 received 
his second contract but for only one hundred families. The territory 
of this contract, which was contiguous with that of his first contract, 
extended his boundaries through the coast reserve to the Gulf of 
Mexico. Its boundaries were as follows: 

Beginning on the Coast of the Gulf of Mexico, at a point distant twenty 
leagues West of Sabine Bay: Thence northwardly on a line parallel with the 
river Sabine, the distance of Ten Leagues leaving between this line and said 
river Sabine a space of Twenty leagues in width: Thence Northwestwardly, 
on a line parallel with the Coast, at a distance of ten leagues from it, and 
following the boundary line (of the Contract made with these same parties 
on 20th Deer., 1826, crossing the river Trinity) to a point on the left bank of 
San Jacinto Creek at a distance of Ten leagues from the Coast on Galveston 
Bay: Thence with the left bank of said River San Jacinto to its confluence 
with Galveston Bay: Thence with the margin of said Bay, by all the sinu¬ 
osities of the same, to the sea coast; and thence with the sea coast to place of 
beginning. 

The third empresario of the group, Lorenzo de Zavala, a prom¬ 
inent Mexican citizen, contracted in March, 1829, to introduce five 
hundred families. The territory included the boundary reserve be¬ 
tween Vehlein’s grants and the Sabine River. The Gulf was the 
southern boundary; a line run from Nacogdoches following the main 
road leading to Natchitoches by the way of “Las Borregas” and the 
ferry to the right bank of the Sabine formed the northern boundary. 

When these empresarios obtained their contracts, they evidently 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS 


93 


acted in good faith and intended making an effort to fulfill them. Veh- 
lein, finding he did not have sufficient capital for the undertaking, 
was therefore willing to combine his interests with others. This fact 
helps to explain the transfer of his grant to a company later. Realiz¬ 
ing his lack of funds, he probably made no effort to establish a colony. 
The same is probably true of Lorenzo de Zavala, as he sold his con¬ 
tract so soon after he obtained it. 

Burnet, on the other hand, made several unsuccessful attempts to 
establish a settlement before the uniting of the grants of Burnet, 
Zavala, and Vehlein in a company at a later period. While in Cin¬ 
cinnati in March, 1829, attempting to obtain immigrants for his colony, 
he thought he had a group of immigrants for his project; but suddenly 
he found they were about to abandon his cause. He wrote to Stephen 
F. Austin: 

I shall remain here longer than I have heretofore contemplated in the hope 
that something may still be done that I may at least get one good stool pigeon, 
for to return without would be to have come for nothing. 

Burnet evidently had no better success later as no colonists received 
grants in his colony before the organization of the company. Zavala 
and Vehlein were equally unsuccessful before the organization of the 
company. Burnet, it seems had attempted to organize a company for 
colonization purposes even before the combining of the three grants 
in the Galveston Bay and Texas Land Company in October, 1830. 
From Cincinnati in July, 1829, he wrote Stephen F. Austin: 

I am fully sensible of the necessity of being in my colony and design to 
repair there as soon as practicable. The late disturbance at Mexico gave me 
a very serious back set from which it has been difficult to recover— I had a 
very respectable company in full progress of formation when the news of wars 
and revolutions and insurrections dispersed them like a hawk pouncing upon a 
flock of pigeons. 

Having failed in his endeavor to establish his colony by his own 
efforts, Burnet, with Zavala and Vehlein, transferred his contract to 
the Galveston Bay and Texas Land Company on October 16, 
1830. . . . 

The Robertson colony .—The boundaries of the Robertson colony 
(called also the Leftwich grant and the Nashville colony) were as 
follows: 

Beginning at a point where the road leading from Bexar to Nacogdoches, 
known as the upper road crosses Navasoto creek, a line shall be run. — thence 
along said road, on a westerly course to the heights which divide the waters 
of the rivers Brazos and Colorado. — thence on a northwest course along 
the said hills or heights to the northernmost head waters of the river “San 
Andres” and from the said head waters northeast on a straight line to the belt 
of [timber on the] Brazos, north from the Hueco village, and known as the 
“Great Forest” and in English as the Cross Timbers, and from the point where 
Said line intersects the “Great Forest” on a Southwest course along the heights 


94 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


which divide the waters of the rivers Brazos and Trinity, to the headwaters of 
Navasoto Creek, — and down the Said creek on its right margin to the place 
of beginning. 

The Milam colony .—Joining Robertson’s colony on the south and 
lying between the Colorado and Guadalupe rivers was Milam’s colony. 
To the east of this long, narrow stretch of territory which formed 
the Milam grant was Stephen F. Austin’s colony. Benjamin R. Milam 
had petitioned the Mexican government for the right to colonize Texas 
lands even before Austin made his first journey to Mexico. 

As early as 1818 Milam was in Texas trading with the Comanches 
on the head waters of the Colorado. The following year found him 
in Mexico fighting for the patriot cause. In consideration of his 
services to the Republican cause, the government made him an eleven 
league grant. He selected his land and opened a ranch, as he thought 
in East Texas; but he found that he had gone too far to the east 
and had located in Miller County, Arkansas. Later he located his 
eleven league grant farther west. 

Not until January 12, 1826, did Milam obtain the grant to estab¬ 
lish the colony which bears his name. The contract called for the 
introduction of three hundred families within the following bound¬ 
aries : 

Beginning at the point where the Upper San Antonio road leading from 
Bexar to Natchitoches crosses the river Guadalupe; thence with the said road 
to the river Colorado of Texas. Thence up said river with its right bank the 
distance of Fifteen leagues. Thence on a straight line, parallel with the road 
aforesaid to the river [Guadalupe. Thence] with its left bank to the place of 
beginning. 

De Leon’s colony .—The minor empresarios who contributed to the 
colonization of Texas were grouped, as previously stated, in three 
distinct regions. To the east bordering on the Sabine were the grants 
of Burnet, Zavala and Vehlein united in the Galveston Bay and Texas 
Land Company; in the central northwest, between the upper waters 
of the Brazos and Guadalupe rivers, lay the colonies of Robertson 
and Milam; and far to the south, on what was then the southern 
boundary of the state, the Nueces River, lay the third group of 
colonies established by the minor empresarios. This southern group 
consisted of three colonies: De Leon’s and Power and Hewetson’s 
on the coast between the lower waters of the La Vaca and Nueces 
rivers, and the McMullen and McGloin colony, which joined Power 
and Hewetson on the west and extended along the north bank of the 
Nueces. 

Of all the empresario colonies established during this period of 
Anglo-American colonization, De Leon’s was the only Mexican colony, 
the only colony that preferred Mexican customs and institutions to 
those of the United States. In the list of names to whom titles to 
land were issued in De Leon’s colony, the Spanish names predominate. 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS 


95 


A few American names appear; but in such a list they seem the 
outsiders, the ones whom the Mexicans have permitted to live among 
them. In all the other minor empresario colonies the Mexican names, 
when they occur, stand out as if they were the foreigners on the soil 
of their own land. De Leon's was just such a colony as Mexico, 
after 1832, came to see she must establish if she desired to retain 
Texas as a loyal part of the nation. 

In April, 1824, Martin De Leon, a native ranchman of the state 
of Tamaulipas, decided he would like to move with his herds to the 
grassy lands of Texas. Just the year before while driving mules from 
his ranch to the market at New Orleans, he had passed through the 
southern part of the state; and it was then that the tall grass of 
South Texas made its appeal to the ranchman. On April 8, 1824, 
he petitioned the Provincial Delegation of San Fernando de Bexar, 
which was the government of Texas, for permission to establish him¬ 
self and forty-one families at a point on the lower Guadalupe where 
he would found a town to be called Nuestra Senora de Guadalupe 
de Jesus Victoria. 

As this was before the passage of the national colonization law, 
the Provincial Delegation of San Fernando de Bexar was the authority 
which granted De Leon his petition. De Leon’s colony was also differ¬ 
ent from the other minor empresario colonies in that his contract 
did not specify a definite number of families to be introduced, 
nor fix a time limit, nor did it establish boundaries for the colony. 
When he had located his group on the lands desired, he was to notify 
the Provincial Delegation in order that the lands might be designated 
for the location of the town, and also that each individual might 
be put in possession of land for his house and field. The contract 
exempted the colony from duties for seven years on everything except 
tobacco, and from excises, tithes and first fruits for ten years. 

By October, 1824, De Leon and twelve of the forty-one families 
promised had established themselves with their droves of horses and 
cattle on the Guadalupe River about one-fourth of a league from the 
Atascocito Road. The other twenty-nine Mexican families expected 
to follow De Leon to Texas, but were prevented during that year 
because of the drought, which destroyed the pasture on the road, and 
later in the same year because of the excessive rains. Shortly after 
the arrival of De Leon, he was joined by sixteen Anglo-American 
families. By the following spring the grassy wilderness had become 
the scene of a flourishing little settlement; the fields had been cleared 
and planted and, among other improvements, provision had been made 
for the watering of the herds of cattle. 

Upon this scene of activity appeared a new empresario, who 
claimed their lands. This was Green DeWitt, who had on April 15, 
1825, received a contract from the legislature of Coahuila and Texas 
for a grant of land which included De Leon’s settlement. DeWitt 


96 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


was as surprised to find the bustling scene of activity in the center 
of his grant as were De Leon and his colonists to learn that their 
lands had been incorporated in another grant. Since De Leon had 
failed to notify the government of his location, the legislature made 
the contract with DeWitt when it was altogether unaware that De 
Leon’s colony would be included by it. De Leon, realizing that his 
Mexican citizenship would give him an advantage over DeWitt, peti¬ 
tioned the government for certain boundaries on the basis of Article 
9 of the National Colonization Law of August 18, 1824, which read: 

In the distribution of lands a preference shall be given to Mexican citizens, 
and no other distinction shall be made in regard to them, except that which 
may be founded on individual merit, or services rendered the country, or under 
equal circumstances, a residence in the place where the lands to be distributed 
are situated. 

On October 6, 1825, Gonzales, the governor of the state, called 
DeWitt’s attention to the second article of his contract, which stated 
that he should respect all possessions given to settlers who were 
occupying lands under legal title within the limits of his boundaries. 
He added that since the Provincial Delegation had given De Leon 
permission to establish a colony there, he therefore had a legal right 
to the land, which DeWitt must respect. The governor designated 
no boundaries for the De Leon settlement, but promised to send a 
commissioner later to put the colonists in possession of their lands. 

In 1827 De Leon petitioned the governor to designate the bound¬ 
aries of his colony. Other colonies had definite boundaries, but his 
were not specified in his contract and seemed to be whatever he and 
his colonists occupied. The boundaries were not established that 
year, but the following year, 1828, Juan Antonio Padilla was ap¬ 
pointed land commissioner for the colony. 

In 1829 De Leon through his attorney Rafael Manchola petitioned 
for an augmentation of land on which he was to introduce one hun¬ 
dred and fifty families. The boundaries for which he petitioned 
included his original settlement and were as follows: 

Beginning at La Baca Creek, near the place where it is crossed by the middle 
road leading from La Bahia to Nacogdoches, and thence run one league with 
the said creek upwards, thence a line shall be run parallel with said road, to 
cross the river Guadalupe at the Lego Ford, until it strikes Coleto Creek; and 
thence with this creek downwards, the survey terminating at its junction with 
the aforesaid river Guadalupe. 

The government granted his petition, but this grant also lay within 
DeWitt’s colony and covered a considerable portion of it. At first 
DeWitt, whose colonists were few in number and who were concen¬ 
trated in and around the little settlement of Gonzales, made no pro¬ 
test; but the following year, 1830, when De Leon attempted to remove 
by force twenty-five of the families established in the region by De¬ 
Witt, a protest was made; and the governor annulled the grant made 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS 


97 


to augment the lands of De Leon. In annulling the grant, the gov¬ 
ernor said that such mistakes as granting the same land to two people 
occurred because the government had no correct map of the state. 

By 1831, the grant to DeWitt had expired and the government 
had refused to allow him an extension. With the expiration of De 
Witt’s contract, De Leon was practically free to colonize the vacant 
lands near him in DeWitt’s colony. The government had said that 
in annulling De Leon’s contract of 1829, it really placed no limitation 
on him except to prevent him from disturbing families already 
established by DeWitt. 

The Power and Hewetson colony .—James Power, a native of Ire¬ 
land, and James Hewetson, a resident of Monclova, contracted on 
June 11, 1828, with the legislature of Coahuila and Texas to intro¬ 
duce into Texas two hundred families, one-half of whom were to be 
Mexicans and the others Irish. The approval of the central govern¬ 
ment had been previously obtained because the grant was within the 
ten coastal leagues. The boundaries were as follows: 

Beginning on the left bank of the River Guadalupe at the angular point 
where it empties into the sea; thence, following the line of the sea coast east¬ 
wards, to the mouth of La Vaca Creek; thence with the right bank of this 
creek, the precise distance of ten leagues; thence a line shall be run westward, 
parallel with the coast, on a border ten leagues, until it meets the river Guada¬ 
lupe; and thence downwards, on the left bank of this river, to the place of 
beginning. 

The McMullen and McGloin colony .—John McMullen and James 
McGloin, natives of Ireland but residents of Matamoras, petitioned 
the legislature of the state of Coahuila and Texas in August, 1828, for 
the territory which had in October, 1825, been granted to John Purnell 
and Benjamin Drake Lovell. One of the partners of the earlier enter¬ 
prise, Purnell, had been drowned just as he was boarding a vessel 
to go to Texas. Lovell, the remaining partner, asked the government 
to release him from the contract, in order that McMullen and McGloin 
might obtain the territory. 

Lovell’s resignation was accepted and a contract made with 
McMullen and McGloin in August, 1828, for the introduction of two 
hundred families within the following boundaries: 

Beginning on the left bank of the river Nueces, at its intersection with the 
boundary line of the ten coast border leagues of the Gulf of Mexico, exempted 
by the law of August 18, 1824; thence with the said boundary line to a point 
ten leagues distant (southwardly) from the Presidio de La Bahia del Espiritu 
Santo (Goliad) ; thence on a straight line, to the confluence of the river Medina 
with the San Antonio; thence with said river, on its right bank, to the point 
where it is crossed by the old road, which leads from Bexar to the Presidio 
of Rio Grande; thence with said road to the river Nueces, and thence with said 
river downwards on its left bank to place of beginning. 

The colony established by McMullen and McGloin was known as 
the Irish colony and had as its leading town, San Patricio or Hibernia. 


98 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Purnell and Lovell .—Of Purnell and Lovell, two of the earliest 
contractors, it can be definitely stated that they fulfilled no part of 
their contract. Dr. John G. Purnell and Benjamin Drake Lovell, 
citizens of the United States who were living in Mexico, petitioned 
for a grant and received it on October 22, 1825. The colony was 
within the following boundaries: 

Beginning on the right bank of the river Nueces, at the boundary line of 
the ten coast border leagues, which are exempted by the fundamental law of 
the 18th of August, 1824; thence with said boundary line of the said Border 
Leagues Eastward, to a point ten leagues from the Presidio of La Bahia del 
Espiritu Santo; thence on a straight line to the mouth of the river Medina 
to its junction with that of San Antonio de Bexar; thence northward with the 
said river Medina, upwards, to the road which is the dividing line between 
Texas and Coahuila, and which leads from San Fernando de Bexar to the 
Presidio of Rio Grande; thence with said road westward to the river Nueces, 
thence down said river southward, which is the boundary line between Texas 
and Tamaulipas, to the place of beginning. 

Frost Thorn. —Frost Thorn, another of the early empresarios, 
made a contract on April 15, 1825, to introduce four hundred fam¬ 
ilies. The boundaries of his colony were as follows: 

Beginning at the closing point of the boundaries of a grant made to Mr. 
Haden Edwards, at fifteen leagues north of Nacogdoches; from this point a 
line shall run north to the line of the twenty boundary border leagues, on the 
boundary line of the United States of North America, on the east and on the 
north, which boundary leagues are not to be encroached upon. Thence on a 
course westwardly to the head waters of Navasoto Creek; thence down said 
creek to the boundary line of Mr. Haden Edwards; and thence with the line of 
said Edwards eastwardly to the place of beginning. 

Wavell’s colony .—General Arthur G. Wavell, through his attor¬ 
ney, Baron de Bastrop, contracted on March 9, 1826, to introduce 
from four to five hundred families in a section of territory on the 
Red River. The boundaries of the grant were as follows: 

Beginning at the junction of the stream called Satecha or Sulphur Fork 
with the Red River of Natchitoches; thence with its bank upwards to its source; 
thence on a straight line parallel with the said Red River to the mouth of the 
River Kiamish, at its confluence with the aforesaid Red River; and thence with 
the bank of said river to place of beginning. 

Benjamin Milam became Waved's agent for the colony. 

Woodbury and Vehlein and Company .—On November 14, 1826, 
John Lucius Woodbury and Joseph Vehlein and Company were 
authorized to introduce two hundred families within the following 
boundaries: 

Beginning at the point where the western line of the colony of Robert Left- 
wich intersects the 31st degree of North latitude, which is between the Rivers 
Colorado and Brazos; thence upwards with said line, on a course northwest, 
to the point at which the boundary line of said grant intersects the parallel of 
32 degrees North latitude. Thence the line shall run on a west course, approx- 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS 


99 


imating to the southern boundary of Stephen Wilson’s colony, to the 104 
degree of longitude, where a land mark shall be established. Hence on a line 
downwards to the point where the meridian of 104 longitude intersects the old 
road leading from the Rio Grande to Bexar. Thence with said road, to the 
river Medina; thence up with the right bank of said river a distance of ten 
leagues. From this point a straight line shall be run an east course to the 
River Guadalupe; thence up the right bank of said river to the boundary line 
of the colony of Colonel Milam; thence on a straight line, along the boundary 
line of the said grant, crossing the river Colorado, to strike the western line 
of the colony of Leftwich at the place of beginning. 

In 1829 the government gave them two additional years within 
which they might complete their contract, it being thus extended to 
1834. An examination of the records of the Land Office reveals no 
evidence of their having located any families or having in any way 
fulfilled the obligations of their contract. 

John Cameron .—John Cameron, a native of Scotland but an in¬ 
habitant of Coahuila and Texas, received two grants in Texas. The 
first grant was on May 21, 1827, for one hundred families within the 
following boundaries: 

Beginning at the point where the parallel of 32d degree of North latitude 
intersects the western boundary line of the colony of Robert Leftwich, which 
is between the rivers Colorado and Brazos. Thence west, on a direct line to 
the point where the 32 degree of North latitude intersects the 102 degree of 
longitude; thence North with the said meridian line of 102 the distance of 
twenty-one leagues; thence diagonally southeast to the western boundary line 
of Robert Leftwich’s colony; and thence with this line to place of beginning. 

Cameron’s second grant was on September 19, 1828, for the land 
which had the year previously been contracted for by Colonel Rueben 
Ross, a citizen of the United States. Ross had died shortly afterward 
“by the hand of a perfidious assassin” in the state of Tamaulipas. 
The contract was for two hundred families to be introduced within 
the following boundaries: 

Beginning at the point which is the western extremity of the boundaries of 
the colony of General Arthur G. Wavell on the Red River of Natchitoches. 
Thence up the said river, which is the boundary line of the United States of 
the North and this Republic, with its meanders, to the point at which it inter¬ 
sects the 102 degree longitude west of London; thence south, on this same 
meridian line the distance of twenty leagues; thence to the east parallel with 
said river of Natchitoches, making a border of precisely twenty leagues, to the 
western boundaries of the colony of General Wavell, closing at the place of 
beginning. 

Colonel Juan Dominguez .—On March 18, 1829, Colonel Juan 
Dominguez, a native Mexican who had served many years in the 
Mexican army, applied for a colonization grant in Texas. The con¬ 
tract was signed May 6, 1829, for two hundred families to be located 
in the following territory: 

Beginning on the River Arkansas at the point where the said river is 
intersected by the 23 degree of longitude west of Washington, which is the 


100 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


boundary line between the Mexican Republic and the United States on the 
North; thence south with the said boundary line on the said meridian the dis¬ 
tance of forty leagues; thence west the distance of twenty leagues, which is 
the boundary line of the boundary border spoken of in the Colonization Law 
of 18th August, 1824; thence north on a line parallel with the meridian line of 
the twenty third degree of longitude west of Washington to the River Arkansas, 
which is the boundary line between this Republic and that of the North; thence 
with the right bank of the river Arkansas to its intersection with the 23 degree 
of longitude west of Washington, which is the place of beginning. 

According to the records in the Land Office, Dominguez intro¬ 
duced no families into Texas. 

Padilla and Chambers .—The grant of Padilla and Chambers to 
colonize Texas lands was contracted for on February 12, 1830, for 
eight hundred families within the following boundaries: 

Beginning at the point where the line of the twenty boundary border leagues 
of this Republic (bordering with the boundary line of 23 degrees of longitude 
west of Washington) intersects Red River of Natchitoches; thence north on a 
line parallel with said boundary line to a point distant twenty leagues from and 
before arriving at the River Arkansas; thence west on a line parallel with the 
River Arkansas to the 25th degree of longitude west of Washington; thence 
south with this meridian to the left bank of the Red River of Natchitoches; 
and thence east with said bank of said River to place of beginning. 

When Padilla and Chambers investigated the location of the grant, 
they found that it was in what is now Oklahoma and Kansas and did 
nothing more with the contract. 

Vicente Filisola .—Vicente Filisola obtained a colonization grant in 
October, 1831, for six hundred families within the following bound¬ 
aries : 

Beginning at the place where the boundary line of the colony of General 
Arthur G. Wavell joins the twenty boundary border leagues, from which point 
a line shall run with the boundary of said colony on a course west to the 
extremity of the same. Thence on a straight line, crossing several of the 
tributaries of the River Trinity, to the point at which the colonies of Citizen 
Stephen F. Austin and that of David G. Burnet join; thence east with the 
boundary of this last mentioned to Sabinas Creek; and thence upwards clear 
of the territoory of the boundary border leagues to place of beginning. 

In the records examined at the Land Office of Texas no evidence 
was found to show that he carried out any part of his contract. 

Stephen Julian Wilson .—Stephen Julian Wilson, a citizen of the 
United States but a resident of Mexico, received a grant on May 27, 
1826, to locate two hundred families in Texas. The boundaries of 
the proposed colony were as follows: 

Beginning at a landmark which shall be established at the point where the 
32d N. latitude is intersected by the I02d of longitude west of London, being 
at the southwest corner of the grant petitioned for by Colonel Reuben Ross; 
thence west with the parallel of 32 degrees of latitude to the eastern boundaries 
of New Mexico; thence north with the boundary line between this state and 
the territory of New Mexico to a point twenty leagues south of the River 


MINOR EMPRESARIO CONTRACTS 


101 


Arkansas; thence east to the meridian of I02d degrees longitude, being the 
western boundary of the land petitioned for by Colonel Reuben Ross; thence 
south to place of beginning. 

The colony lay largely in the territory which is now New Mexico. 
A very small part of it was in the western border of the “Panhandle” 
of Texas. 

Wilson and Exeter. —Joining Wilson's first grant, Wilson and 
Richard Exeter, an English merchant, obtained a second grant on 
September 23, 1828, for the introduction of one hundred families 
within these boundaries: 

Beginning on the right bank of the River Arkansas at the boundary line 
of the state with the territory of New Mexico; thence down said river to the 
point where it is intersected by the I02d degree of longitude west of London; 
thence south twenty leagues on the same meridian (102) ; thence west parallel 
with the River Arkansas to the eastern boundary line of the territory of New 
Mexico; thence following the said boundary line to the right bank of the River 
Arkansas to the place of beginning. 

The grant to Wilson and Exeter covered a large area in eastern 
New Mexico, southwest Colorado, and the “Panhandle” of Texas. 
During the summer and fall of 1833 a group led by A. Le Grande 
engaged in a survey of the grant; but with the coming of the winter 
snows, they were forced to abandon their work. The survey was 
never resumed nor was anything else done toward the colonization 
of the grant. The contract expired in September, 1834. 

Beales and Royuela. —John Charles Beales, in addition to being 
interested in the Exeter and Wilson grant, was interested in three 
other grants. One of these, the Beales and Royuela grant, was ob¬ 
tained on March 14, 1832, for the introduction of two hundred fam¬ 
ilies within the following boundaries: 

Beginning at a landmark which shall be established at the intersection of 
the 32 d degree of north latitude with the I 02 d degree of longitude west of 
London— this point being the southwest corner of the grant applied for by 
Colonel Rueben Ross; thence west with the parallel of the 32d degree of lati¬ 
tude to the eastern boundary line of this State and the territory of New Mexico 
to a point twenty leagues south of the River Arkansas; thence east to the 
meridian of I 02 d degree of longitude, being the western boundary of the lands 
applied for by Colonel Rueben Ross; and thence south to place of beginning. 

Beales and Royuela apparently did nothing with this grant; ac¬ 
cording to Land Office records no titles were issued. 

Campos for the Mexican Company. —Beales was one of the mem¬ 
bers of the Mexican Company, which received the first contract under 
the Law of April 28, 1832. The law had been passed to encourage 
Mexican colonization. The contract was made on May 1, 1832, for 
4^0 families and comprised the territory of Milam’s colony and part 
of DeWitt’s. 

Beales and Grant. —With the last of his contracts, Beales appar- 


102 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ently made a determined effort to establish a colony. On October 9, 
1832, Beales and Dr. James Grant made a contract to introduce eight 
hundred families in the territory between the Nueces and Rio Grande 
rivers. 


Summary 

If Austin and DeWitt are included, the empresarios may be said 
to fall into three groups: the first, those who completed their contracts 
as Austin and DeWitt; the second, those who partially fulfilled their 
contracts; and the third, those who failed to meet any of the obliga¬ 
tions of the contracts. In the first group Austin, who finished several 
of his grants, has been authoritatively treated by Dr. Eugene C. 
Barker in The Life of Stephen F. Austin. Green DeWitt, who lacked 
only a few families of introducing the total number of families desig¬ 
nated by his contract, has been discussed by Miss Ethel Zivley Rather 
in The DeWitt Colony. 

The purpose of this paper was to investigate the history of the 
last two groups, the minor empresarios. In the first of these last two 
groups should appear the names of Burnet, Zavala, Vehlein, Robert¬ 
son, Milam, De Leon, Power and Hewetson, and McMullen and 
McGloin. The last group, or those who in no wise fulfilled their con¬ 
tracts, contains the names of Wavell, Wilson, Wilson and Exeter, 
Woodbury, Cameron, Dominguez, Filisola, Padilla and Chambers, 
Thorn, Purnell and Lovell, Beales and Royuela, Campos for the Mex¬ 
ican Company, and Beales and Grant. 


CHAPTER XI 


THE GOVERNMENT OF TEXAS, 1821-1835 

By Eugene C. Barker 

[This article, which describes the government of Texas before the Texas 
Revolution, is adapted from The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XXI, 223- 
252. The work of the ayuntamiento of San Felipe is typical of the work of 
all the ayuntamientos and shows the local government in operation. The min¬ 
utes of the ayuntamiento of San Felipe are published in The Southwestern 
Historical Quarterly, volumes XXI-XXIV; and a detailed study of “The 
Municipal Government of San Fernando de Bexar” by Mattie Alice Austin is 
in The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, VIII, 277-352.] 

I. The Eastern Interior Provinces, 1820 

In 1820, when Moses Austin made his memorable journey to San 
Antonio to ask permission to settle three hundred families in the 
Spanish province of Texas, the territory was one of the Eastern 
Interior Provinces ( Provincias Internas de Oriente). Texas, Coahuila, 
Nuevo Leon, and Santander or Tamaulipas constituted the Eastern 
Interior Provinces. The commandant was both civil and military head 
of the provinces. Each province had its own governor and military 
commandant and was subdivided, or could be divided, into departments, 
districts ( partidos ), and municipalities. Texas constituted one depart¬ 
ment, and in 1820 contained but two organized municipalities, Bexar 
and La Bahia, the present Goliad. The government of a municipality, 
which included not only the town but much of the surrounding country, 
was an ayuntamiento. 

II. Early Local Government in Austin’s Colony 

(/) Powers granted to Stephen F. Austin. —In August, 1821, 
after the death of Moses Austin, Governor Martinez recognized 
Stephen F. Austin as his father’s successor, authorized him to explore 
the country and select the region which he wished to colonize, and 
approved the terms which he proposed for the distribution of land to 
settlers. Since the region selected by Austin would be a wilderness, 
uninhabited and without political organization, and since he himself 
would have no means of extending administration to it at once, the 
governor made it plain that, for a time, Austin must be responsible 
for the local government. “You will cause all the colonists to under- 

103 


104 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


stand,” he told Austin, “that until the government organizes the 
authority which is to govern them and administer justice, they must 
be governed by and be subordinate to you.” 

Early in 1822 Austin found it necessary to visit the City of Mexico 
to get a confirmation of his permit, and the imperial decree of Feb¬ 
ruary 18, 1823, which granted this, provided that he should form his 
colonists into militia companies; and, until the government of the 
settlement was organized, charged him with the administration of 
justice. This authority was confirmed on April 14 by the supreme 
executive power which succeeded Iturbide. 

At Monterey, in May, 1823, on his way home, Austin sought a 
more particular definition of his position. Did his judicial authority 
extend to the punishment of capital crimes, or only to the arrest of 
the criminal for trial at Bexar; and how was the cost of justice to 
be met? Did he have authority to make war on the Indians? What 
was to be his rank in the national militia? 

General Felipe de la Garza, who had succeeded Arredondo as 
Commandant of the Eastern Interior Provinces, answered Austin’s 
questions on June 16. In all capital cases he was to refer the record 
of the trial and the verdict to the superior government, and while 
awaiting its report was to work the prisoner on the public roads. He 
had full authority to wage war on the Indians; and was to be lieu- 
tenant-colonel of militia. 

“In short,” said Austin of himself, “the provincial deputation de¬ 
creed that I should preserve good order, and govern the colony in all 
civil, judicial, and military matters, according to the best of my abili¬ 
ties, and as justice might require, until the government was other¬ 
wise organized and copies of laws were furnished, rendering to the 
Governor of Texas an account of my acts, or of any important event 
that might occur, and being myself subject to the governor and the 
commander-general. The local government was thus committed to me 
with the most extensive powers, but without any copies of laws, or 
specific instructions whatever, for my guide.” 

(2) Administrative divisions .—On his return to the colony, Aus¬ 
tin found that Governor Trespalacios, who had succeeded Martinez 
in August, 1822, had divided the settlement into two districts, one on 
the Colorado and one on the Brazos, with an alcalde in each to look 
after details of local administration and justice. In December, 1823, 
Austin subdivided the Brazos district, and made a third, which he 
called the San Felipe district; in the fall of 1824 he incorporated into 
his colony some immigrants who had drifted in and settled on the 
San Jacinto, and continued the district already there; in January, 
1826, he established the district of Mina, on the Colorado; and at the 
same time, apparently, subdivided the San Felipe district to create the 
district of Victoria. By the beginning of 1828 there was still another 
district, making seven in all. Associated with the alcalde in the admin- 


THE GOVERNMENT OF TEXAS, 1821-1835 


105 


istration of these early districts there was a “constable” with substan¬ 
tially the authority and functions of such an officer at present. 

(j) Austin's “Instructions and Regulations for the Alcaldes —• 
For two years the alcaldes seem to have followed a procedure of their 
own, each “doing what was right in his own eyes,” but probably con¬ 
forming as nearly as conditions and his own knowledge would permit 
to the practice of a justice of the peace in the United States. It was 
power of a sort which they did not enjoy, however. John Tumlinson, 
alcalde of the Colorado district, begged Bastrop for a “rule whereby 
I may in future be governed for the general good and peace of 
society.” Josiah H. Bell, of the Brazos, after confiscating the prop¬ 
erty of a horse thief to pay for the stolen horses and the cost of 
capturing him, anxiously asks the governor to say whether he has done 
rightly. His successor, John P. Coles, in a somewhat similar case 
resorted to a jury of six who fined the defendant heavily and sug¬ 
gested that he be banished from the colony. 

To introduce a more uniform system, and to relieve the alcaldes 
of responsibility and embarrassment in the fixing of fines and 
penalties, Austin, on January 22, 1824, published a set of “Instruc¬ 
tions and Regulations for the alcaldes.” This document constituted 
a brief civil and criminal code. James Cummins acknowledged receipt 
of his copy on March 23: “I think them good for which myself and 
my neighbors give you thanks. May the Lord direct us to administer 
them properly.” 

The Civil Code provided for the appointment by Austin of a 
sheriff to execute his own processes as judge, and constables to execute 
those of the alcaldes; fixed the jurisdiction of alcaldes; and prescribed 
a definite judicial procedure. The alcalde acting alone had final juris¬ 
diction under ten dollars, acting with arbitrators he had final juris¬ 
diction up to twenty-five dollars, and primary jurisdiction, subject to 
appeal, in cases up to two hundred dollars. 

As the first step in settling a case, the alcalde must try to bring 
the litigants to an agreement by “conciliation”—a sort of settlement 
out of court. If conciliation failed, he proceeded to try the case alone 
or with the help of arbitrators, as the parties to the suit determined. 
The political chief, Jose Antonio Saucedo, approved this code on May 
23 and added to Austin’s draft two articles, one regulating the treat¬ 
ment of stray animals and the other the registering of marks and 
brands. 

The Criminal Code Saucedo approved the next day, May 24. 
Articles 1-4 of the criminal law dealt with offenses by Indians—such 
as violence to colonists, rambling through the colony without license, 
stealing, etc. Anybody was authorized to arrest and conduct such 
Indians, without the use of arms, if possible, to the nearest alcalde 
or captain of militia. If, upon examination by such official, the In¬ 
dians proved to be guilty, they might be punished by twenty-five lashes. 


106 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Section 5 dealt with offenses against Indians. The colonists were 
forbidden under penalty of heavy fines to abuse Indians, being en¬ 
joined, on the contrary, to treat them “at all times and in all places 
in a friendly, humane, and civil manner so long as they deserve it. 

Several articles covered offenses by and against slaves and pro¬ 
vided for the recovery of fugitives and stolen slaves by their owners. 
The rest of the regulations dealt with various crimes—some suggested, 
no doubt, by anticipation and some by actual experience in the colony: 
murder, theft, robbery, gambling, profane swearing and drunkenness, 
counterfeiting or passing counterfeit money, etc. Horse racing was 
excepted from the general prohibition of gambling, “being,” it was 
explained, “calculated to improve the breed of horses,” but no debt 
contracted thereby was recoverable by law. 

All cases must be investigated by the alcalde and tried by a jury 
of six and the record and verdict transmitted to Austin for final 
judgment. Capital cases must, as we have seen, be submitted by 
Austin to the authorities at Monterey. 

Fines were the usual penalties prescribed by the regulations—to 
be applied to schools and other public purposes—but whipping and 
banishment from the colony were allowed. For theft the penalty was 
a fine of three times the value of the stolen property, and hard 
labor on public works, “until the superior government decides on the 
case.” 

Austin’s “Old Three Hundred” were a remarkably law-abiding 
people. He wrote Bastrop in December, 1824, that since his return 
from Mexico, more than eighteen months before, there had been only 
one theft. Had the alcaldes exercised judicial functions alone, there¬ 
fore, their public duties would have been unimportant, but they per¬ 
formed other services. They were Austin’s local correspondents, 
receiving, passing on to the people, and executing his orders, and 
keeping him informed of local opinions and conditions. They super¬ 
vised militia elections; kept their districts free of prowling Indians 
and vagabonds; settled quarrels; attested contracts; and performed 
what passed in effect for a civil marriage ceremony. They occupied, 
in fact, a sort of patriarchal relation to their respective communities. 

With the rapid influx of immigrants, after 1825, judicial business 
increased and Austin found himself unable to spare the time from 
other pressing demands to attend to appeals from the alcalde courts. 
On July 6, 1826, he issued a proclamation ordering each of the six 
districts then existing to elect a representative to meet with him to 
form a new judicial system and adopt an equitable system of taxation 
for its support and to defend the settlements from hostile Indians. 

The result of this conference was the creation of a supreme court 
composed of any three alcaldes. This court might hear appeals even 
from Austin himself, but it is evident that in most cases the appeal 
was directly from a single alcalde to this body without going before 


THE GOVERNMENT OF TEXAS, 1821-1835 


107 


Austin. The court of the alcaldes, as Austin called it, held three ses¬ 
sions a year at San Felipe. 

( 4 ) The Militia .—Two other subjects demanded Austin’s early 
attention—the organization of the militia and the establishment of a 
land system. By the national law of April 9, 1823, every male citizen 
between the ages of eighteen and fifty was subject to militia service, 
and, as we have seen, Austin was by the terms of his commission 
commander-in-chief of the militia of his colony. For a time the 
menace of the Indians was an effective stimulus to the observance of 
the law. In June, 1823, while on his way from Mexico, Austin issued 
an order dividing the scattered settlements into five districts and 
instructing the inhabitants to elect company officers in each. For 
several years the service was fairly burdensome, and from time to 
time Austin had to subdivide the original districts to permit greater 
flexibility and local independence in dealing with marauding tribes. 

A history of the militia, if material were available, would involve 
a history of the Indian wars of colonial Texas. By 1829 the white 
man’s power was established, raids became infrequent, and interest 
in the militia organization diminished to such a degree that Austin 
complained that less than thirty per cent of the voting strength of 
the companies took the trouble to vote for officers. They had much 
more important matters, they thought, to occupy them. 

(5) The Land System .—This topic deserves treatment in a sepa¬ 
rate paper. Only a summary can be given here. The subject received 
Austin’s closest attention, and brought him more annoyance than any 
other problem with which he had to contend. 

Austin had wide discretion in the allotment of land to settlers in 
his first contract, and some who received less than others accused him 
of partiality and unfairness. He knew the history of the harassing 
litigation that beggared the early settlers of Kentucky and Tennessee, 
and the orderly surveys and necessary formalities and restrictions 
which he insisted on to prevent such a condition in Texas seemed to 
some who could not understand their beneficent purpose merely irri¬ 
tating interferences of a petty tyrant. His surveyors and clerks had 
to be paid, and because he exacted a fee of 12 y 2 cents an acre for 
the land, some of the settlers abused him for exploiting them. 

First as to the fees: on August 18, 1821, just before leaving San 
Antonio to select the land for his colony, Austin submitted a plan to 
Governor Martinez for the distribution of the land to settlers. Every 
man, whether married or single, should receive a town lot and a 
parcel of farming and grazing land, the farming land fronting on a 
water course. If married, two hundred additional acres should be 
granted the settler in the wife’s right, eighty acres for each child, 
and fifty for each slave. 

Martinez endorsed the plan and forwarded it to the commandant 
for approval. From Natchitoches Austin wrote him on October 12 


108 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


that he had decided to diminish the amount of land to single men 
and increase it to heads of families, giving them 640 acres for a head- 
right, 320 acres for the wife, 160 for each son, and 80 for each slave. 
He had already made contracts with colonists, agreeing to deliver 
land at 12cents an acre and bear all costs himself for surveying, 
issuing and recording titles, and for the stamped paper on which the 
deeds were written. Half was to be paid on receipt of title and the 
other half a year after. On returning to New Orleans, Austin pub¬ 
lished these termns in the newspapers and they were widely copied 
by the western press. 

On December 15, 1821, Gaspar Lopez, who had succeeded Garza 
as commandant general of the Eastern Interior Provinces, wrote 
Martinez that Austin had no authority to make allotments of land, 
that his applications must be presented to the government, and that 
should the settlers arrive in the meantime, the nearest ayuntamiento 
should locate them provisionally until the supreme government passed 
the necessary laws. Martinez reported the substance of this to Austin 
in March, 1822, and advised him, if he wished to avoid delay, to go 
to the capital and urge his cause in person. 

After one night’s deliberation Austin set out for Mexico City, 
where he arrived on April 28. He found the new government unwill¬ 
ing to make a special order of his case, and had to wait with what 
patience he could until Congress should pass a general colonization 
law. The committee in charge of the subject worked slowly, with 
many interruptions and diversions, so that it was not until January 
4, 1823, that the law was passed. “I can,” said Austin, “without 
boasting, say that my constant exertions and importunity with the 
members both directly and indirectly through my friends produced 
this law.” 

Six weeks later (February 18) the Emperor approved Austin’s 
petititon to settle his three hundred families on the terms established 
by the law. Only two features of the law need be noticed here. One 
increased enormously the amount of land that Austin had promised 
his colonists, allowing headrights of a labor (177 acres) of farming 
land and a league (4,428 acres) of grazing lands; and the other pro¬ 
vided for the compensation of empresarios or contractors who intro¬ 
duced immigrants at the rate of 66,774 acres for each two hundred 
families. 

With success already within his grasp, Austin’s hopes were now 
dashed by the overthrow of Iturbide and the annulment of all the 
laws passed since his accession. On April 14, however, the constituent 
Congress confirmed his grant as defined by the imperial decree, and 
he departed for Texas. He was delayed at Monterey, as we have 
seen, settling details concerning his authority in the administration of 
the colony, and did not arrive in Texas until mid-summer. 

There dissatisfaction already existed over the 12^/2 cent fee which 


THE GOVERNMENT OF TEXAS, 1821-1835 


109 


the settlers had agreed to pay, and in an open letter of August 6, 
Austin made it plain that they must fulfill their contracts. He had 
risked his life, health, and property in the enterprise, he told them, 
and would make the fortunes of all his followers; to the expense 
already borne he must still add that of surveying and of issuing and 
recording titles. The government did not pay a cent toward these 
expenses, and a moment’s reflection ought to convince them that they 
must help him a little. Those who could must pay money, others could 
pay in any kind of property that would not be a dead loss to him— 
horses, mules, cotton, hogs, poultry, furs, beeswax, home-made cloth, 
dressed deerskins, etc. They could pay part down and the balance 
in two, three, and four years. Most of what he collected would 
really go to improve the colony, he said, so that all would benefit 
from it. 

Four days later Bastrop, whom the governor had appointed com¬ 
missioner to extend titles to the settlers, pointed out to the colonists 
some of the advantages which they enjoyed through Austin’s labors: 
his grant was confirmed, their titles were secure, and would be issued 
at once; no other contract had been approved. Austin’s grant was 
limited to three hundred families; Austin was absolute in determining 
who should be received into the colony; and those rejected by him 
would have to retire to the interior, there to await the disposition of 
the government. The murmuring continued, but for a time the settlers 
paid the fee. 

On October 30, Austin drew up an explicit statement of the con¬ 
ditions of settlement in his colony: settlers must give “the most 
unequivocal and satisfactory evidence of unblemished character, good 
morals, sobriety, and industrious habits”; and must have sufficient 
means to pay for their lands and get a start in the colony as farmers 
or mechanics. “No frontiersman who has no other occupation than 
that of a hunter will be received—no drunkard, no gambler, no pro¬ 
fane swearer, no idler . . . will be received.” 

Those rejected for bad character would be ordered from the settle¬ 
ments, and, if necessary, escorted out under guard, their own property 
being seized to pay the cost of the escort. Persons accepted as settlers 
would receive, as a rule, a league of land of their own choice at the 
rate of $12.50 per hundred acres, payable in cash, cattle, or negroes, 
on receipt of title. This payment would include the cost of survey¬ 
ing, issuing and recording title, and all other charges. 

Persons with large capital or a large family might obtain more 
than a league. Single men must combine in groups of ten in order 
to receive a league in common. 

The next day Austin issued a public notice requiring newcomers to 
report immediately upon arrival to the nearest alcalde; if they wished 
land, they must report to Austin himself and show evidences of good 
character before selecting it. 


no 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

In the meantime, murmurs over the 12 cen t ^ ees reached 
San Antonio, and on May 20, 1824, the political chief, Antonio Sau- 
cedo, declared a schedule of fees which took no account of Austin s 
contracts. Thereafter for a league of land, the settler should pay 
$127.50 to the commissioner who gave him his title, $27 to the sur¬ 
veyor, $8 for clerical labor and stamped paper, and $30 to the govern¬ 
ment, or a total of $192.50, while at 12^2 cents an acre it would have 
cost him $555. . . , 

Austin believed that Saucedo had no authority to interfere, with 
his private contracts, and in a straightforward review of the history 
of the colony made a powerful argument for their observance. The 
enterprise, he said, had cost his father’s life; he himself had spent 
three years and much money in getting the colony established; the 
contract was a fair one; they had accepted it freely and with full 
knowledge of its terms, and not one of them but knew he was getting 
good value for his money, because titles in Austin’s grant were secure 
and would be issued immediately, while settlers in other parts of the 
province had not the slightest assurance that they would ever get 
titles. If the governor had the right to annul a private contract, 
would their titles be safe? Where could one draw the line? 

When one remembers that the cost and labor of the local adminis¬ 
tration fell mainly on Austin, that presents to keep the Indians peace¬ 
able and sometimes the equipment for campaigns against them were 
paid for by him, that his house was a place of entertainment for 
travelers visiting the country with a view to settling, that he paid 
a secretary $1000 a year chiefly to record titles and prevent conflicts 
and costly litigation by the colonists, it is easy to understand that his 
premium lands would not only have been an inadequate compensation; 
but for years would not have reimbursed him for actual expenses. 

Much of his difficulty Austin attributed to the colonists’ ignorance 
of the Spanish language and to the indefiniteness of certain laws. 
“You know,” he wrote in 1825, “that it is innate in an American to 
suspect and abuse a public officer whether he deserves it or not. I 
have had a mixed multitude to deal with, collected from all quarters, 
strangers to each other, to me, and to the laws and language of the 
country. They came here with all the ideas of Americans and expect 
to see and understand the laws they are governed by. . . . Could I 
have shown them a law defining positively the quantity of land they 
were to get and no more and a code of laws by which they were 
to be governed I should have had no difficulty but they saw at once 
that my powers were discretionary, and that a very great augmentation 
to their grants could be made, and thus the colonization law itself and 
the authority vested in me under that law holds me up as a public 
mark to be shot at by every one.” 

Many of the settlers offered to pay, but Austin relinquished his 
claims and collected from none. Later both federal and state colo- 


THE GOVERNMENT OF TEXAS, 1821-1835 


111 


nization laws guaranteed such contracts between empresarios and 
colonists, and in his subsequent contracts Austin took advantage of 
this legal provision and charged colonists a small fee for his services. 

The main features of the land system as finally developed by Austin 
may be restated for the sake of clearness. From the beginning Austin 
had sole authority to admit or reject immigrants within the broad 
limits of his grant, and the law, as well as sound policy required him 
to prevent the settlement of bad characters. He therefore required 
applicants to file testimonials of character from responsible persons 
and take the oath of allegiance to the Mexican government before 
granting them certificates of admission, which authorized them to 
select land and have it surveyed by an official surveyor appointed by 
the commissioner. This done, and the necessary notes and fees at¬ 
tended to, the applicant petitioned for his title, which, upon proper 
attestation from Austin, the commissioner issued. 

Essentially, of course, the land system was the same as that in 
the United States, so that Austin’s claim to our admiration is not that 
he originated an excellent system, but that at the cost of much labor 
and some money he so faithfully adhered to a model already tested 
by the experience of a generation. 

III. Establishment of Normal Government—the Ayuntamiento 
of San Felipe 

On June 15, 1827, the governor promulgated a law entitled, “regu¬ 
lations for the political administration of the towns.” This law pre¬ 
scribed the form of the town governments according to size, and laid 
down the duties of the town councils or ayuntamientos. 

The duties of the ayuntamiento covered a wide range, including 
most of the functions of a modern city commission and some of those 
belonging to the county commissioners. It was expected to promote 
the establishment of hospitals, poorhouses and educational and chari¬ 
table institutions, and to administer them when established; it was to 
license qualified and properly certified physicians and druggists and 
prevent others from practicing; it was to appoint boards of health, 
inspect foods, markets, and drug stores, keep the streets clean, visit 
prisons, drain lakes and stagnant ponds, and wage continual war on 
every menace to the health of man and beast; it was to see that streets 
were straight and ornamented with shade trees, and wherever possible, 
paved and lighted; it was to maintain roads and public buildings; pre¬ 
serve the forests; punish vagabonds, drunkards, idlers, and gamblers; 
promote agriculture, industry, and commerce; administer municipal 
funds, which, with the consent of the governor and legislature, 
might be raised by taxation; establish and supervise primary schools; 
and take the census every six months. These were some of the 
more important duties of the ayuntamiento. 


112 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Austin was at Saltillo in the fall of 1827 and took occasion to urge 
the establishment of constitutional government in his colony. In re¬ 
sponse to his request the governor, on November 17, instructed the 
political chief to order an election for an ayuntamiento with jurisdic¬ 
tion from the Lavaca to the watershed between the Trinity and the 
San Jacinto and from the sea to the San Antonio Road. Austin called 
the election for February 3-4, 1828. 

The duties of the alcalde fell into three general classes: (1) He 
presided over the ayuntamiento and was its executive officer; (2) he 
was a primary judge, or judge of first instance, having sole jurisdic¬ 
tion in cases under $10, final jurisdiction acting with a representative 
of each of the parties to the suit in cases between $10 and $100, and 
preliminary, examining jurisdiction in all other cases; (3) and he was 
the medium of correspondence and administration between the colony 
on one side and the superior department and state authorities on the 
other. The natural comparison that comes to mind is that of a mayor 
who has not given up his judicial functions to police judges, but the 
alcalde’s part in the state administration was much more direct than 
that of our mayors. 

We are fortunate in having the minutes of the ayuntamiento of 
San Felipe for the first four years of its existence—from February 
12, 1828, to January 3, 1832—and in being able to see therein the 
Anglo-American adapting himself to Spanish local institutions. The 
first returns showed Thomas M. Duke elected alcalde over Austin’s 
candidate, Ira Ingram, by a vote of 121 to in. Thomas Davis and 
Humphrey Jackson were elected regidores and Rawson Alley sindico. 
Austin had called attention to the necessity of frequent meetings, and 
urged the choice of members within convenient distance of San Felipe, 
but Duke lived ten and Jackson thirty leagues from the capital. The 
result could be easily foreseen. After regular meetings for less than 
two months the ayuntamiento adjourned to meet no more, if we are 
to judge from the absence of minutes, until time to canvass the next 
election returns in December. 

A study of the minutes for the next three years shows the ayun¬ 
tamiento performing the various functions of a modern city and county 
commission: laying off roads and supervising their construction; regu¬ 
lating ferries and ferriage rates; creating boards of health, boards of 
medical examiners, and quarantine boards; regulating weights and 
measures; repairing churches and public buildings; directing militia 
organization; holding special elections and settling election disputes; 
serving generally as conservator of public morals, first warning and 
then punishing vagrants and drunkards, enforcing the laws against 
gambling and other forms of vice, and closing “tipling shops” at ten 
o’clock. 

It assisted Austin in keeping the colony free of undesirables, advis¬ 
ing when to grant and when to withhold titles to land; and relieved 


THE GOVERNMENT OF TEXAS, 1821-1835 


113 


him of no little responsibility in deciding when titles should be for¬ 
feited for non-fulfillment of the conditions of the grant. 

Finally, it strove earnestly, but without success, to raise funds for 
the establishment of an academy at San Felipe. 

The problem of getting revenue for indispensable expenses re¬ 
mained always a most difficult one and the collections left no surplus 
for permanent improvements. The courthouse and jail projected by 
the first ayuntamiento were still unbuilt in 1832. This made the safe¬ 
guarding of prisoners awaiting trial an expensive and embarrassing 
task, and helped to emphasize the defects in the judicial system. 

The opportunities for delay in the judicial system were very 
great, and its inconvenience to the Texans was enormous. In any 
case of corporal punishment there was first an examining trial before 
the alcalde, the evidence was then forwarded to the attorney general 
at Saltillo, some 500 miles away, his report was returned to the alcalde 
and judgment pronounced, but before it could be executed the judg¬ 
ment and all the documents in the case must make another trip to 
Saltillo to receive the approval of the Supreme Court. 

With the least possible delay four months were consumed in this 
procedure, and the normal time was from six to eight months. In 
the meantime the prisoner was supposed to be in jail or employed on 
the public roads. If, as at San Felipe, there was no jail, his safe¬ 
keeping was both expensive and embarrassing. 

It remains only to speak of the election of state officers. These 
were chosen by indirect vote, the citizens of each municipality elect¬ 
ing electors in August who met at the capital of the department in 
September and voted for governor, vice-governor, the executive 
council, and members of the federal Congress and the legislature. 
Before taking their seats it was customary for the newly elected mem¬ 
bers of the legislature to ask and receive formal instructions concern¬ 
ing legislation which their constituents desired. 

Until 1832, when the ayuntamiento of Brazoria was created, all 
the Anglo-American portion of Texas, except that between the Sabine 
and the San Jacinto, was subject to the jurisdiction first of Austin 
and then of the ayuntamiento of San Felipe. The machinery of local 
government in frontier societies is likely under the most favorable 
conditions to work jerkily, with much grumbling and protesting, re¬ 
flecting the characteristics of the community. The normal “North 
American frontier republican” is impatient of the restraints and for¬ 
malities of law; and here the natural difficulties of local administra¬ 
tion were aggravated by the obstacle of language and the colonist’s 
inability to inform himself of the laws. It, nevertheless, seems plain 
from the documents that actual government in Austin’s colony con¬ 
formed with noteworthy fidelity to the constitution and the laws. 
Perhaps this was due in part to the fact that in its essentials the 
system did not differ greatly from that with which the colonists were 


114 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


already familiar, but it was also due in no small measure to Austin’s 
powerful influence and unremitting oversight. “Upon the whole,” 
wrote a recent settler from Missouri in 1832, “I believe we get along 
full as well as the inhabitants of territories in the United States, 
believe the laws here are as well administered as they are in Arkansas 
and perhaps better, and equally as well as they were when I first 
went to Missouri.” 


CHAPTER XII 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 

By Stephen F. Austin 

[The first of these descriptions was written in August, 1828, as an accom¬ 
paniment to Austin’s map of Texas. It is taken from an undated clipping from 
the Galveston News in the Austin Papers of the University of Texas. The 
second was apparently intended for publication in pamphlet form to be circu¬ 
lated in Europe. The federal law of April 6, 1830, closed Texas to emigrants 
from the United States, except in the existing colonization contracts of Austin 
and Green DeWitt. Austin and Samuel M. Williams obtained a contract in 
February, 1831, to settle eight hundred families of Mexicans and Europeans, 
and this pamphlet was intended to promote emigration from Europe. It seems 
not to have been printed. The original manuscript is in the Austin Papers. 
The third description was written in August, 1833, to support the application 
of the convention of that year for the erection of a state government in Texas 
separate from that of Coahuila. In it Austin certainly exaggerates the popu¬ 
lation, and, possibly, the economic development of Texas in order to strengthen 
the claim for State organization. The document is from the University of 
Texas transcripts from department of fomento, Mexico. It should be compared 
with Austin’s Exposicion Sobre los Asuntos de Tejas, written in January, 1835 
(translation by Ethel Zivley Rather, The Quarterly of the Texas State His¬ 
torical Association, VIII, 232-258), and with J. N. Almonte’s ^Noiicia Estadis- 
tica sobre Tejas, a translation of which by Carlos E. Castaneda is published 
in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XXVIII, 177-222. These descrip¬ 
tions are published in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XXVIII, 98-122.] 

Texas in 1828 

Texas embraces a very extensive and valuable territory. A 
single glance at the map will be sufficient to indicate the great 
advantages derivable from its local position in point of climate 
and commercial facilities. It bounds the territory of the United States 
on two sides, the east and north, and extends as it were liked a penin¬ 
sula into that nation. 

The intercourse by water along the coast is easy and safe. Three 
or four days’ sail takes you from the coast of Texas to the mouth 
of the Mississippi, or to Vera Cruz, or the Havana. The land com¬ 
munication is equally easy, being open on the whole extent of the 
Louisiana and Arkansas frontiers, and susceptible of good roads, 
leading into Opelusas, Attakapas, Natchitoches, and the upper settle¬ 
ments of the Arkansas or Red River, and also, to New Mexico, Chi- 

115 


116 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


huahua, and all the Mexican states lying to the west. The West Indies 
lie in front, and an immense extent of Mexican coast to the south, 
thus affording channels of commerce in every direction. 

The climate of Texas is mild and healthy. The territory lies 
between 28, and 34, north latitude, and is gently fanned throughout 
the summer by pleasant and refreshing sea breezes. The country is 
intersected by four rivers that are navigable from one hundred to 
four hundred miles, to wit: the Neches, Trinity, Brazos, and Colorado, 
besides a great number of small streams that afford good navigation 
for a shorter distance; and the abundance of its creeks and living 
springs, taken in connection with its topographical character, prob¬ 
ably present more extensive facilities for colonizing than can be found 
on the same surface in any other part of North America. 

Texas forms an immense inclined plane, the apex of which is 
the highlands south of Red River, in which its rivers have their source. 
From this summit, to the Mexican Gulf, the inclination is towards 
the southeast, and is astonishingly uniform. The surface is beautifully 
undulating to within about sixty miles of the sea coast, where it be¬ 
comes level. Some parts of the northwestern section are hilly, par¬ 
ticularly on the heads of the Colorado and Guadalupe rivers, though 
the general feature of an inclined plane is observable throughout, 
for the hills do not form leading ridges that impede the flowing 
waters to the southeast, neither are the undulations greater than are 
necessary to render the country dry, healthy and beautiful. The hills 
gradually lessen until they lose themselves in the level strip that bor¬ 
ders on the coast, which is from forty to seventy or eighty miles 
wide. 

The rivers and creeks form very deep beds with high banks, through 
this level region, and the tide water flows up them from twenty to 
forty miles. The whole of this tract without exception is entirely 
free from marsh or lakes, even down to the sea beach. The soil 
is of the first quality of alluvian lands, the banks of the streams are 
heavily timbered, and covered with immense cane brakes; between 
them is level, but dry and rich, prairie land. 

The timbered bottom lands on the rivers are from two to fifteen 
miles wide, a small part is subject to inundation in extreme high 
freshets, but the floods are not frequent, and owing to the compara¬ 
tive shortness of the rivers soon subside. The undulating country 
has timbered and prairie land conveniently intermingled, abounding in 
springs of good water, and the same may be said of the hilly country 
on the Colorado and Guadalupe. The pasturage is surprisingly abun¬ 
dant and luxuriant and is good both summer and winter. 

Texas possesses many beds of good iron and lead ore, and it is 
said that copper, silver, and gold have been found in small quan¬ 
tities in the high region of the Colorado, but no experiments in min¬ 
ing have been made, for two reasons, one is, the supposed mines of 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 117 


the precious metal are in the Indian country, and another, the want 
of population and capital. 

Nature seems to have formed Texas for a great agricultural, 
grazing, manufacturing, and commercial country. It combines in an 
eminent degree all the elements necessary for those different branches 
of industry. It possesses at least 70,000 square miles of sugar lands, 
south of latitude 30 and east of the river Nueces, which is the western 
boundary of Texas. This river is about 80 miles east of the Rio 
Grande, or Bravo del Norte. The northern and high parts of the 
country are well adapted to wheat and small grain, and the situation 
of the streams affords great facilities for waterworks and irrigation. 
The whole country produces cotton of the best quality, acknowledged 
in New Orleans to be superior to Louisiana cotton. The tobacco and 
indigo is also of superior quality, the latter is spontaneous growth of 
the country. In addition to these, the soil and climate are well adapted 
to the culture of the vine, the olive, and other fruits and productions 
of a temperate southern latitude. The country on the Sabine, Neches 
and Trinity rivers abounds in good pine timber, and some cypress, 
and cedar, though the two latter are not abundant, and live-oak and 
the other species of oak and the North American timber is sufficiently 
abundant in every part of the country, except the southwestern section 
on the Nueces, which is thinly wooded. 

The Mexican government with a degree of liberality unequaled 
have opened this fine and truly desirable country to the enterprising 
and industrious of all nations; lands are granted to emigrants for 
almost nothing. The principal requisite to obtain them is actual re¬ 
moval and settlement, and unquestionable evidence of good character, 
and steady, moral and industrious habits; indeed, without such evi¬ 
dence, no one is permitted to receive land as a settler. 

In the winter of 1820-21 Moses Austin of Missouri visited Texas, 
and obtained from the Spanish authorities permission to introduce 
and settle three hundred families from the United States in Texas. 
This gentleman died on his return to Missouri, and the enterprise 
was taken up by his son, Stephen F. Austin, who visited and explored 
the country in the summer of 1821, and made the necessary arrange¬ 
ments with the governor of the province. He returned to Louisiana, 
and in December of the same year arrived on the Brazos river, with 
a part of the families he was authorized to colonize. After the inde¬ 
pendent government was established, and organized, he visited the 
City of Mexico, and obtained a full confirmation of his grant to settle 
the colony from the National Mexican Congress, and has subsequently 
obtained a large extension of the same. 

Texas, at the time Austin entered it, was entire wilderness with 
the exception of the old Spanish posts of San Antonio de Bexar and 
La Bahia (Goliad), and they were poor and inconsiderable villages 
reduced to wretchedness and misery by the arbitrary and cruel meas^' 


118 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ures of the Spanish general in 1813 after the defeat of the Republicans 
on the Medina; and by the subsequent Indian war, with the Comanches, 
and other savages. 

Between the Sabine and San Antonio, a distance of four hundred 
miles there were not twenty souls of civilized inhabitants, and the 
country was occupied in every direction by wandering bands of the 
Comanches, Lipans, Tancawas, Wacos, Tawacanys, Karankaways and 
other Indians. 

The government at this period (the winter of 1821-22) was un¬ 
settled; all Mexico was in revolution. The Spanish power was pros¬ 
trated, but much doubt and uncertainty prevailed as to the final result. 
Public opinion, and parties vacillated between monarchy, aristocracy 
and republicanism; and it would seem that even these flattering hopes 
could have offered few inducements to enter Texas with families of 
women and children, under such circumstances. 

Colonel S. F. Austin, and the families who embarked with him, 
in the arduous effort of settling this wilderness, knew and fully under¬ 
stood their situation, and the risk, perils, and hardships they must 
necessarily be exposed to. They had confidence in themselves, and 
relied upon that confidence alone for safety, and protection and suc¬ 
cess. The alarming and exaggerated rumors that went abroad relative 
to the sufferings of the first settlers greatly impeded the progress 
of the new settlements, and increased Colonel Austin’s difficulties in 
procuring emigrants. True it is, the first adventurers suffered 
greatly. They did not taste bread for six months; their only hope 
for subsistence was the game of the forests until they raised a crop; 
and they were constantly harassed by Indian depredations. The 
vessels sent round from New Orleans by Austin with provisions and 
supplies were lost on the coast and plundered by the Indians, and 
many other casualties occurred; but great as the obstacles were that 
opposed their settlements in this wilderness, their fortitude and per¬ 
severance was still greater, and success has fully rewarded their toils. 

Austin’s colony at this time (August, 1828) contains about 3,000 
inhabitants and is flourishing. The settlers are beginning to reap the 
fruits of their labors; they have opened extensive farms, and the 
produce of the soil far exceeds their most sanguine expectations. A 
number of cotton gins and mills are in operation and several more 
are building; about six hundred bales of cotton and eighty hogsheads 
of sugar will be made this season. Commerce begins to enliven the 
shores of the river, and peace and plenty everywhere prevail. 

There probably is not at this time such an opening on the globe for 
industry and enterprise as in Austin’s colony. Land of good quality 
may be had in large tracts by emigrants of good character, which will 
enable a man of large family to settle all his children around him; 
the cost will not exceed four cents per acre, including surveying, office 
fees, and all other charges, and five and six years are allowed to pay a 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 119 


part of that in. Those who emigrate now will have none of the diffi¬ 
culties of the first settlers. Provisions are abundant and cheap, roads 
are opened. The Indians are subdued, and driven back and are all 
at peace. The country is known, and an experiment of six years has 
proved its healthfulness and value. At this time no one comes on an 
uncertainty—the government is settled on the basis of true repub¬ 
licanism. The new settlers are represented and enjoy every civil 
privilege that reasonable men need ask. Those who are here are con¬ 
tent, and say that this is the easiest and most favorable and munificent 
government they ever lived under. 

Slavery is prohibited by the Constitution, but contracts made with 
servants or hirelings in a foreign country are guaranteed by a special 
act of the legislature, as valid in this state. 

The general character of the settlers of Austin’s colony is that of 
moral, industrious, and good citizens. The local government has been 
administered without the aid or necessity of one soldier to enforce 
obedience. Crimes, rioting, and those disorders incident to all new 
countries are almost unknown, and impartial men will say that no 
new settlement on any frontier of the United States can boast of 
more good order, morality, and subordination to the laws than Aus¬ 
tin’s colony. 

It has been a rule with Colonel Austin from the beginning to 
receive none but good men and to drive away bad ones, and he will 
now receive none who do not present evidence of good character from 
the local authorities of the place where they remove from. 

Men of large families and small or no capital cannot do better 
than to emigrate to this country. Austin is authorized to settle a large 
number of families, and his well known and established character 
with the Mexican government—his experiences in colonization, and his 
uniform devotion to the interest of the settlers, to the accommodation 
of honest poor men, and to the general prosperity of the country 
probably qualifies him as well to succeed as any other now engaged 
in enterprises of this kind. 

Austin was the first who attempted to colonize in Texas. He 
opened the way, and has devoted seven years of the prime of his life 
to this object. His present poverty as to monied capital or disposable 
means affords an unquestionable and honorable proof that he has been 
influenced more by the general good and prosperity of the settlers 
than by views of individual profit, for had the reverse of this been 
his object, he has had abundant opportunities of speculating, but he 
could not embrace them without neglecting what he deemed to be his 
duty to his settlers, and therefore he did not. 

The success of Austin’s colony in the wilderness of Texas, under 
the disadvantages and difficulties that opposed such an enterprise, 
affords a most striking and highly honorable example of North 
American enterprise, perseverance and fortitude, and it has paved the 


120 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


way for the settlement of the whole of this fine and heretofore un¬ 
inhabited country. 


Texas in 1831 

The encouragement given by the Mexican government and by the 
state of Coahuila and Texas to emigrants to Texas from Europe 
merits the popular attention of those who have a desire to better their 
fortunes by a removal to America. It is believed that the advantages 
which may be secured by a removal to that desirable country, Texas, 
are much greater than have ever before been offered by any govern¬ 
ment of either hemisphere. 

Texas at present forms a part of the state of Coahuila and Texas. 
It is provisionally annexed to Coahuila until its population and re¬ 
sources are sufficient to form a separate state distinct from Coa¬ 
huila. 

It is situated on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico to the west of 
Louisiana, from which it is separated by the Sabine river. The lati¬ 
tude is from 28° to 34 0 3c/ north. It is bounded on the east by Louis¬ 
iana, on the north by Red River which separates it from Arkansas, 
on the west by the Nueces river which divides it from Tamaulipas and 
Coahuila, and on the south by the Gulf of Mexico. The climate is 
salubrious, temperate, and pleasant. The soil is of superior quality 
and remarkably fertile and productive. The natural pasturage for 
horses, cattle, sheep, goats, hogs, etc., etc., is beyond description lux¬ 
uriant and is sufficient to support large droves of those animals win¬ 
ter and summer without any other expense than herding, so as to 
prevent their scattering. 

The staple articles of Texas will be long and short staple cottons 
of fine silky texture and very superior quality, sugar, indigo, tobacco, 
wine, olives, wheat, flour, maize, rice, beans, peas, potatoes and veg¬ 
etables of various kinds, beef, pork, bacon, butter, cheese, horses, 
mules, hides, tallow, fine and coarse wool, and lumber. Some experi¬ 
ments have been made of hemp, flax, wheat, rye, oats and barley, 
which have succeeded very well in the undulating country back from 
the coast. The fruits will be peaches, oranges, limes, lemons, figs, 
etc., near the coast, and apples, peaches, pears, grapes, etc., in the 
interior. 

The mineral wealth of Texas has never been carefully examined 
or explored. It is, however, well known that iron ore of good quality 
is very abundant in many places on the headwaters of the Sabine 
river, and also not more than one hundred miles from the coast on 
the Brazos, Colorado and Guadalupe rivers. Lead ore (galina) has 
also been found in various places. Sulphur is very abundant on 
Trinity river. Stone or bituminous coal has been found in quantities 
on the Trinity, Brazos and Colorado rivers, and no doubt abounds. 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 121 


A silver mine is known on the San Saba river, a western branch of 
the Colorado. Salt is easily made on the coast, and salt springs are 
very numerous in various places in the interior. 

New Orleans, which is within three days’ sail of the mouth of 
the Brazos or a short journey by land, the West Indies, and the cities 
of Matamoras, Tampico, Vera Cruz, Campeche, etc., on the Gulf of 
Mexico, will always afford a profitable market for some of the articles 
of Texas produce, particularly horses, mules, oxen, and beeves for 
the New Orleans market and all kinds of provisions, stock, and lum¬ 
ber for the Mexican and West Indies markets. The interior of 
Mexico will also afford a market for many articles of Texas produce 
and manufacture. 

Galveston, Matagorda, Aranzas, and the Nueces Bays, and the 
mouth of the Brazos river are all good inlets. The first two have 
twelve feet of water over the bar, the other two bays have eight feet 
and the mouth of the Brazos has six feet. Custom houses are 
established in Galveston and Matagorda bays, and at Brazoria near 
the mouth of the Brazos river. The other two bays are not regular 
ports of entry, owing to the wilderness state of the country round 
them, but will no doubt be opened as soon as the Irish colonies are 
filled up which have been commenced on that part of the coast of 
Texas, and which are now prosperous, considering the newness of 
their establishment. 

The rivers of Texas are the Sabine, Neches, Trinity, Brazos, and 
Colorado, all navigable a considerable distance into the interior, also 
the San Jacinto, Buffalo Bayou, San Bernard, La Baca, Guadalupe, 
San Antonio, Aransas, and Nueces all navigable a short distance. Of 

all the rivers of Texas, the Brazos and Colorado are the largest. The 

Guadalupe and San Antonio are very beautiful rivers of pure foun¬ 
tain water, and afford a great many eligible situations for water mills, 
as also do the innumerable creeks and branches of the other rivers. 

Texas is divided into three distinct tracts or regions of country, 
whose characteristics are, in many respects, entirely different. These 
are the level, the undulating, and the mountainous regions. 

The whole coast of Texas, from the Sabine to the Nueces, is 
rather low and very level, but is entirely free from marsh, so much 
so that in most places a loaded wagon may be driven down to the 

sea beach or shore of the bays without any difficulty. There is a 

belt of prairie along the coast which extends back eight or ten miles 
and is timberless except for the skirts on the rivers and creeks, which 
reach to the beach. 

The level region extends back from the coast in a northwesterly 
direction about seventy or eighty miles as far west as to the vicinity 
of the Guadalupe river, west of which to the Nueces the undulating 
lands reach to within twenty or thirty miles of the coast. 

The country on the Sabine, Neches, Trinity, and San Jacinto is 


122 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


heavily timbered and wooded with thick groves of good pine, cypress, 
oak, ash, and other timber. The level region extends back about 
seventy miles from the coast in this section of Texas, east of San 
Jacinto. Above that to the north and northwest the country is gently 
undulating to Red river, there being no part of it mountainous or 
even sufficiently broken to be called hilly. The thickly wooded lands 
continue quite to Red river north of the heads of the Sabine and 
Neches, and pretty high up on Trinity. Above this and west of the 
headwaters of the Sabine there is a considerable belt of gentle un¬ 
dulating prairie country extending up and down Red river which is 
thinly timbered, the groves being confined to the margins of the 
streams. 

The whole of this eastern and wooded region is very abundantly 
supplied with living streams of pure water, which afford many favor¬ 
able sites for saw and other mills, either water or steam. The lumber 
business from this quarter will be very valuable so soon as mills are 
put in extensive operation. There is now one steam saw mill com¬ 
pleted on the Buffalo Bayou, and another is building on the east bank 
of San Jacinto near its mouth. The soil in this wooded section is 
generally well adapted to agriculture, though it is greatly inferior in 
fertility and in pasturage to the country on the Brazos, Colorado, and 
Guadalupe rivers. 

The old Spanish military post and village of Nacogdoches is situ¬ 
ated in the center of this section of Texas, about sixty miles west 
of the Sabine. In 1819-20 it was totally broken up by the revolution 
and abandoned and so remained until S. F. Austin commenced the 
settlement of his colony on the Brazos river in 1821. It is now a 
respectable village, and has a garrison of Mexican troops. The 
adjoining country, and between there and Sabine, has a considerable 
population of respectable farmers. 

A military post and town was established in 1830 by order of his 
excellency General Teran, on the northeast bank of Galveston Bay, 
opposite the mouth of Trinity, and called Anahuac. The country on 
Trinity river in the neighborhood of this place is pretty well settled 
with Americans and there is also a considerable settlement of them 
low down on the Neches. 

Anahuac will no doubt become an important place, as it will com¬ 
mand the trade of the Trinity river, and a considerable portion of 
the San Jacinto and Neches. 

That section of the level region of the coast situated between the 
San Jacinto and the Guadalupe rivers, including the lower parts of the 
Brazos, San Bernard, Colorado, and La Baca rivers, extends into 
the interior a northwesterly direction about eighty miles from the 
coast. The soil over the whole of this extensive section is of the 
first quality, and probably is exceeded in fertility by no other tract 
of country on earth of equal size. The land is sufficiently elevated 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 123 


to drain easily and rapidly after heavy floods of rain, and the supply 
of permanent water and timber is quite abundant. 

The alluvial or bottom lands of the Brazos, San Bernard, and 
Colorado are from four to fifteen miles wide, heavily timbered, cov¬ 
ered with immense and almost impenetrable cane brakes, free from 
all injurious overflows from the rivers, and entirely clear of large 
lakes, wet swamps or marsh. The Guadalupe, La Baca, Navidad, and 
a number of creeks that intersect this level region also afford large 
bottoms or tracts of alluvian soil on their margins, and are well 
timbered. 

The intervening country between the rivers and creeks is open, 
level, rich, and elevated prairie, clothed with a very thick and luxuri¬ 
ant growth of grass of a good quality for pasturage. Very pure and 
palatable water is found in wells from twelve to twenty feet deep 
all over this level region, and the water of the rivers and creeks is 
also good and wholesome. 

Near the mouth of the Brazos a town has been founded by S. F. 
Austin called Brazoria, which is the commercial depot of that river, 
and of the adjoining country on the San Bernard river. It is im¬ 
proving and flourishing very rapidly and must become a large and 
very important place in a few years. 

A town has also been laid off at the mouth of the Colorado river 
on the Bay of Matagorda, which is called Matagorda. This place 
will become the depot of the Colorado river and of a very rich and 
extensive country. 

The town of San Felipe de Austin, founded in 1824 by S. F. 
Austin and the commissioner of the government, Baron de Bastrop, 
as the capital of Austin’s colony, is situated on the west bank of the 
Brazos river about eighty miles by land and two hundred by water 
from its mouth, and at the upper or northern limits of the level 
region. It is the residence of the empresario, S. F. Austin, and the 
state and municipal officers of the jurisdiction, and all the land and 
judicial business is transacted there. 

Above, and to the northwest of the level region last noticed, the 
country is beautifully and gently undulating. This description of 
land extends up the Brazos, Colorado, and Guadalupe rivers one 
hundred and fifty to two hundred miles above the upper limits of 
the level region and reaches to the mountain ranges of Texas. 

This undulating region is probably as desirable a country for all 
the wants and necessities of man as any other on earth. The soil 
is generally of first quality. The climate is much more wholesome 
and pleasant than in the level region. There are no mosquitoes or 
horse flies of any consequence. The surface is beautifully and very 
fancifully diversified and checkered off into small prairies and wood¬ 
land tracts, thus presenting to the farmer large fields of rich lands 
cleared by the hand of nature and ready for the plough. The stir- 


124 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


rounding groves of woods afford the best of oak, cedar, and other 
timber at a convenient distance for building and fencing. 

This whole tract of undulating country is very well watered, and 
abounds in permanent running springs and creeks which all have 
more or less bottom lands, and are very beautifully lined with the 
lofty forest trees of the rich alluvial soils. The undulations are in 
many places quite elevated, but rise gently and a long distance before 
you reach the summit. There are but very few steep or abrupt breaks 
or cliffs, and nothing that would be called hilly. 

From the summits of these elevations the landscape is very richly 
and agreeably diversified by the gentle and extended slopes. The 
round tops of the elevations here crowned with a grove and there 
presenting a bald surface of grass, the rich pale yellowish green of 
the small prairies or natural lawns, the dark foliage of the cedars, 
lofty woods that fringe the banks of the creeks and drains which 
wind their serpentine course through the small valleys and natural 
meadows at the feet of the undulations, all combined present a land¬ 
scape at once pleasing to the eye, and cheering to the imagination, 
which in its fancy fills the scene under view with fine forms, the 
abode of health, plenty, cheerfulness, and happiness. 

A military post and village have been established on the west bank 
of the Brazos above the upper road and about twelve miles below the 
mouth of the San Andres river, and about one hundred miles above 
San Felipe de Austin. This post is called Tenoxtitlan and is beauti¬ 
fully situated and abundantly supplied with large and pure fountains 
of water. It is understood to be the intentions of government to keep 
up a considerable garrison at this place to protect the northern frontier 
of the colony from the Indians, and also to promote the settlement of 
the interior country on the Brazos. Tenoxtitlan bids fair to become 
a considerable inland town. The country round it is very fertile and 
pleasant, and the Brazos river is navigable above this in time of 
freshets. 

The level region lying to the west of Guadalupe and between that 
river and the Nueces differs from the other parts of the coast in 
being much more scarce of timbers, in fact almost destitute except 
on the San Antonio and Aransas rivers where there is a sufficiency, 
though not an extensive body. The soil is very rich and fertile, the 
water good. The climate is more pleasant and wholesome than far¬ 
ther east, and the pasturage much better, being composed of a different 
kind of grass called the mesquite grass. It is fine, seldom exceeds 
six inches in height, resembles the blue grass, and is the most nutri¬ 
tious pasturage in the country—it also has the advantage of being 
green all winter. 

Two Irish colonies have been contracted for with the government 
by four gentlemen of Ireland, on the Nueces and between that river 
and the Guadalupe. These colonies have been commenced, and are 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 125 


in a state of favourable advancement and offer a very fine opening 
to Irish emigrants. 

The country back and to the northwest of the level region last 
mentioned (between the Guadalupe and Nueces) is undulating, moder¬ 
ately so at first, and rising higher by degrees to the mountain range 
about two hundred miles distant. The whole of this section affords 
the best of pasturage, being principally of mesquite grass, and is prob¬ 
ably better adapted to graze in than any other part of Texas. The 
soil in general is good—timber and water are scarce, the nopal, or 
prickly pear grows here in great quantities and very large. Lime¬ 
stone is abundant, to within fifteen or twenty miles of the coast. 

There is a low tree belonging to the locust family, called the mes¬ 
quite, which is very abundant all over this section. It seldom grows 
larger or taller than a very large peach tree, which it resembles very 
much in its general appearance. The leaves are those of the honey 
locust, only smaller, it has a small thorn, it bears a bean pod about the 
size and shape of the common snap bean, which is very sweet, is used 
by the Indians in time of scarcity of food, and is equal to corn to 
fatten horses, cattle or hogs. The wood of this tree is very lasting, 
fully as much so as cedar, and is very valuable for posts in making 
post and rail fences. It is also better for fire-wood than ash or hick¬ 
ory. The leaves of the mesquite are thought to be the best food 
that can be obtained for goats, and as those trees are low and in 
many places are only shrubs the goats keep fat by browsing on them 
when there is no grass. 

The tender leaves and fruit of the prickly pear are very nutritious 
food for horses and horned cattle, particularly the latter, which fatten 
on them. 

The town of San Antonio, or San Fernando de Bexar, is situated 
in this region on the San Antonio river in latitude 29 0 25' north, 
longitude 99 0 30' west. This place is the capital of Texas, and con¬ 
tains 2,500 inhabitants. The village of Goliad (formerly La Bahia) 
is situated on the same river in latitude 28° 55' at the upper extremity 
of the level region and about twenty-five miles from the coast. 

The mountain range extends from the mouth of Rio Puerco, a 
branch of Rio Bravo, in a northeasterly direction, and enters Texas at 
the sources of the Nueces river, thence continuing its northeasterly 
direction to the head of the San Saba, a branch of Colorado, it bends 
more to the east down the San Saba and crosses the Colorado below 
the mouth of the San Saba, and is finally lost in the undulating 
country on the west of the Brazos near the mouth of the San Andres, 
or San Gabriel, a considerable tributary of that river, about two hun¬ 
dred miles above the town of San Felipe de Austin. The mountain 
range does not cross the Brazos river, and the country east of that 
river and up the Trinity is gentle, undulating, and in some places 
quite level. 


126 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


High up on the Brazos river there is a large mass of metal which 
it is said is worshiped by the Comanche Indians. It is of several 
tons weight—is bright—has no rust or oxide of any kind on its 
surface and is perfectly malleable. A large piece of this metal was 
taken at a great expense to New York by way of Natchitoches many 
years since, under the belief that it was platina, but it is said that 
the experiments made by Dr. Mitchel and other chemists in that 
city proved that it was pure iron in a malleable state. The existence 
of such a mass of metal is beyond all doubt and can be attested by 
many persons in Natchitoches and in Texas who have been to the 
place. 

Spurs of the mountain range extend southwardly down the rivers 
Medina and Guadalupe to the vicinity of Bexar and within sight of 
the road leading from that place to Nacogdoches called the upper 
road, and also down the rivers Llano and Pedernales, branches of the 
Colorado. Similar spurs also stretch up the Colorado above the mouth 
of San Saba and round the headwaters of the San Andres between 
the Colorado and Brazos. 

These mountains are of third and fourth magnitude in point of 
elevation. Those of San Saba are the highest. They are in many 
places thickly covered with scrubby cedar, live oak, and other trees. 
Granite, limestone, quartz, and other species of mountain rock usu¬ 
ally found in mountains are very common, and it is believed they 
abound in mineral wealth, particularly on the San Saba, where tradi¬ 
tions say a rich silver mine was successfully wrought many years 
since, until the Comanche Indians cut off the workmen. 

Very large and fertile valleys of rich arable alluvial land are found 
all through this range, particularly on the San Saba, Llano, Pedernales, 
Conchos and Pecan Bayou, branches of the Colorado, on the San 
Andres and Bosque, a branch of the Brazos, on the Guadalupe, 
Medina, and Nueces. The sides and tops of the mountains are also 
in most places susceptible of cultivation. 

The soil is generally rich and well adapted to wheat and other 
small grains, and to the vine and northern fruits. The pasturage for 
horses, cattle, sheep and goats is very good all over these mountains, 
particularly for the two latter, and there is no doubt this section of 
Texas will afford very large quantities of wool for home manufacture, 
or for exportation. 

This range of high land is no doubt of very great advantage to 
Texas. It renders the air more pure, and abounds in large fountains 
of pure water, which flow off with a rapid current and uniting form 
the large rivers of the central and western parts of Texas—all of 
which are much more wholesome and limpid than those to the east of 
the Brazos. 

This mountain region will also at some future time supply all 
Texas with good wheat flour, and afford a considerable surplus for 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 127 


exportation also with rye, hemp, flax, and northern fruits and wine. 
Iron, lead, and several other valuable metals will be supplied from 
this section, and also stone coal. It will be a very favourable country 
for raising fine horses; the climate and pasturage will suit them better 
than in the level and hot regions near the coast. 

North of this mountain range and on the extreme head of the 
Brazos and Colorado the country becomes level and forms high and 
interminable prairies, which stretch to the north and northwest beyond 
the Red and the Arkansas rivers and are lost in the vast ocean of 
prairies which extends to the heads of [the] Missouri and to the Rocky 
Mountains. 

Texas, as an extensive country, is probably the most desirable part 
of North America. Its climate is diversified, salubrious, and pleasant. 
It affords every species of soil which can be found in level, alluvial, 
undulating, or mountainous countries, embracing all the varieties of 
clayey, sandy, pebbly, rocky, alluvial, and all their intermixtures. It 
is sufficiently supplied with good timber and wood lands—also with 
the most useful metals. Its rivers and harbors are abundantly suffi¬ 
cient for all the purposes of commerce, and it is conveniently situated 
on the coast of the Mexican Gulf to trade with the United States of 
the North, the Mexican ports, the West Indies or with Europe. It 
is susceptible of great internal improvements by rail or turnpike roads 
and canaling. 

The question may be asked why has this very desirable country 
never been heard of or settled before? The answer is plain. The 
Spanish government locked up Texas, as it did all its American posses¬ 
sions, and even excluded visitors and travelers. In consequence of 
this policy Texas remained unknown and an entire and howling wilder¬ 
ness filled with uncivilized Indians, from the limits of Louisiana to 
the villages of La Bahia (now Goliad) and San Antonio de Bexar, 
until the year 1821, when Mr. Moses Austin of Missouri obtained 
permission to settle a colony of three hundred families in Texas. He 
died in June of that year, and his son S. F. Austin explored the 
country during that summer, and in the following winter he com¬ 
menced the settlement of Austin’s colony on the Brazos and Colo¬ 
rado rivers. After ten years of most untiring perseverance he has 
fully succeeded in redeeming from the wilderness all that part of the 
coast of Texas lying between and around Galveston and Matagorda 
bays, and as far into the interior as to the upper or San Antonio 
road. 

Austin’s colony has now (1831) upwards of six thousand inhab¬ 
itants, principally North Americans, and some English, Irish, and 
Germans. Very rigid rules were adopted by Austin, under the orders 
of government, to exclude all men of bad character and dissolute 
habits from his colony, which is composed of farmers of great re¬ 
spectability and industry. The most conclusive evidence that can be 


128 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


presented of Austin’s fidelity and care in the discharge of his duties 
and of the high standing and respectability of his colony, is the fact 
that both himself and the colony possess the full confidence of the 
Mexican government, and have uniformly received the protection and 
cordial approbation of all the superior federal and state officers. 

This colony contains many large and productive farms, and the 
crop of cotton in 1831 was upwards of one thousand bales, of five 
hundred pounds of clean cotton each bale, and in 1832 it will greatly 
exceed that amount. Considerable quantities of provisions are raised 
of all kinds which might be plenty and cheap, and besides this, the 
introduction of provisions, frame houses, and lumber from foreign 
countries is permitted by law for the present free of duty which will 
allow emigrants to bring supplies with them. 

Agreeably to the existing laws European emigrants (except Span¬ 
iards) are preferred to any others, and important advantages are given 
to them over North Americans from the United States. 

There cannot be a doubt but that industrious farmers and capi¬ 
talists would materially benefit themselves by a removal to Texas. 
The industrious and economical farmers would soon advance their 
fortunes and make themselves independent by agriculture, and the 
money of the capitalists invested in manufactories, agriculture, or 
commerce would yield them an immense interest. 

The quantity of land that is granted to settlers is of itself a hand¬ 
some fortune. Agreeably to the existing colonization laws a family 
gets one league of land and a single man the quarter of a league. A 
Mexican league is equal to four thousand four hundred and twenty- 
eight acres, English measure. The whole cost of a league will in no 
case exceed four cents per acre, including the surveying, establishing 
the corners, office and commissioner’s and government fees and 
charges, and all other expenses whatever. For a considerable portion 
of this small sum a long credit of from one to four, five, and six 
years is given. 

S. F. Austin, who has been successfully engaged in colonizing for 
the last ten years, and whose character for good faith and integrity, 
and high standing with the government are well established, has 
authority to settle European families on the vacant lands remaining 
within the limits of his old colony and in a new addition which in¬ 
cludes all the undulating and a part of the mountain regions on and 
between the Brazos and Colorado rivers. 

Emigrants are not confined to Austin’s colony, the whole of Texas 
is open to them and they can settle in any part of it by applying to 
the proper authority for permission, and complying with all the legal 
requisites. The colony, however, clearly presents more advantages 
than any other part of the country, owing to its advanced state, the 
good moral character of its inhabitants, the organization of its local 
government, and the facilities of procuring accommodations immedi- 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 129 


ately on landing, provisions, and the means of transportation (horses, 
wagons, etc.) into the interior of the country. Also in the colony all 
the business of the settler, writing petitions, translating, and inter¬ 
preting is done for him and information is given as to what land is 
vacant and what is not, and its situation and quality, the charges for 
all which are included in the before mentioned sum of four cents per 
acre. 

Austin’s object never has been a mere speculation, on the contrary, 
he has always complied rigidly and scrupulously with his contracts and 
obligations as a colonizing agent, and as an officer of this government 
and labored to settle this country with moral, and industrious farmers. 
No money is required by him of the settler until he has first examined 
the land, or is satisfied as to its quality and has received the legal title 
for it in due form from the government commissioner appointed to 
issue land titles or patents. 

None but emigrants of the best class as to moral industrious and 
sober habits and respectable character and standing in the country 
where they remove from will be received by Austin, and each one will 
be required to accredit his character by evidence from the civil or 
judicial authority of the place of government he removes from, and 
no one need apply for admission into this colony without such evi¬ 
dence properly authenticated to avoid fraud or impositions. 

Also, none need apply or expect to get a title for land in the 
colony or in any other part of Texas until after he has actually re¬ 
moved his family and settled himself permanently in the country. The 
idea which seems to have prevailed in New York and other parts of 
the United States that land can be held in Texas by foreigners who 
live in a foreign country, or who are not legally naturalized, is totally 
incorrect and in direct opposition to all the land laws, regulations, or 
even customs of the Mexican government. An actual removal to the 
country is therefore necessary before any title can issue; and an actual 
occupation and cultivation of the land granted, within the time pre¬ 
scribed by law, are indispensable requisites to perfect the title, after 
it is issued. Those who have any idea of removing to Texas would 
do well to keep these facts in remembrance. 

The political constitution of the state of Coahuila and Texas pro¬ 
hibits slavery forever within its territory, so that after the slaves 
are dead who were introduced before the constitution was published, 
Texas will be entirely clear of that worst of reproaches against a free 
and enlightened people. The exclusion of slavery opens a vast field 
in Texas for the enterprise and profitable employment of white 
laborers. 

Experience has clearly proved for ten years past that white men 
can labor in Texas as well and as safely to their health as anywhere 
else. They must use some precautions it is true the first year until 
they are somewhat acclimated, and there never is any urgent necessity 


130 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


for hard labor on a farm, or exposure to the heat of the sun after 
the month of July. All the heavy part of the labor on a farm is done 
during the winter, spring* and autumn months. In the winter the 
land is cleared, fenced, ploughed and prepared for planting. In Feb¬ 
ruary and March it is planted. Before July the crops are all worked 
and weeded and finally laid by, as the farmers term it. In October 
and November the crops are gathered. Wheat, rye, and other small 
grains ripen and are reaped the last of May, before the hot weather 
comes on. 

English, Irish, German, Dutch, French, etc., farmers, and capital¬ 
ists who emigrate to Texas, would do well to bring a number of fam¬ 
ilies with them as laborers, bound under written contract to serve for 
a term of years for certain fixed and specified wages. Such contracts 
would be binding and could be enforced by the existing laws. It is 
confidently believed by the writer of this that if Texas were to be 
explored by an English, German, Dutch, or French gentleman of such 
known respectability and character in his own country, as would give 
full credit to his statements and representations after he returned, it 
would be the means of benefiting himself and a large number of his 
countrymen by inducing them to emigrate. 

Many erroneous opinions and false and unjust impressions pre¬ 
vailed in England some time ago, in consequence of the statements 
made in the English parliament by several distinguished members, in 
the debate relative to Mexican affairs. Sir Robert Wilson and others 
thought proper to state, in that debate, that the colonists of Texas had 
rebelled, that they were composed of fugitives and turbulent persons, 
squatters, etc., and that the Mexican government had sent a force of 
4,000 men to expel them from the country, etc., etc. Now the fact 
is, such statements never had the least foundation in truth, and evi¬ 
dently must have been made from erroneous information. The colo¬ 
nists of Texas were invited into the country by the colonization laws 
of the Mexican government, and did not intrude themselves into it 
by force and illegally. 

The settlers of Austin’s colony so far from rebelling or manifest¬ 
ing anything like discontent, have on various occasions repelled the 
inroads of hostile Indians, and maintained good order and the authority 
of the government whenever it was disturbed. This colony, the first 
that was undertaken, the only one that has fully succeeded, has sus¬ 
tained itself and the authority of government in the midst of a dis¬ 
tant and isolated wilderness, without the aid of one soldier or of 
one dollar from the Mexican government. It is well known that the 
settlers of Austin’s colony are not illegal intruders or squatters. The 
single fact that the founder of this colony is a member of the legis¬ 
lature or Congress of the State of Coahuila and Texas, and was elected 
to that office by the votes of his settlers, ought to be sufficient and con¬ 
clusive evidence as to this point, for had he, or his colonists intruded 


DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828, 1831, AND 1833 131 


themselves illegally into the country, the Legislature would certainly 
never have permitted him to take his seat, neither would the right of 
suffrage have been recognized in the colonists, a right which can only 
be exercised by naturalized citizens. 

The motto adopted by Austin when he began his colony was 
“Fidelity and gratitude to Mexico, and to be true and faithful to her 
interests, and also to the just rights and interests of his colonists.” 
This motto has been and is the great governing principle of the set¬ 
tlers. They will no doubt continue to be, as they ever have been, 
true and faithful to the government of their adoption, and also true 
to themselves. Should their adopted country and government be un¬ 
justly and wantonly assailed by the United States of the North (as 
the British orators most erroneously and without any reason unjustly 
supposed it would be) or by any other power whatever, they would 
be amongst the first to take up arms in its defense and risk their 
property and lives to sustain the independence and constitution of 
Mexico; and on the other hand should they be unjustly and arbitrarily 
oppressed and their rights of property or of persons be wantonly 
trampled upon, they will of course resist, and defend their property 
and persons to the utmost of their power, as Englishmen, and as the 
Parliament orators themselves would do under similar circumstances. 
But on this subject, there have prevailed in the United States of the 
North as many and as gross and utterly unfounded errors as those 
above alluded to in England. 

The colonists of Texas up to the present time have not been op¬ 
pressed by the government. They are satisfied and have full confi¬ 
dence in the justice and liberality of their adopted government. It 
is truly unfortunate that any erroneous opinions should prevail on 
these subjects, in Europe or in the United States, or amongst the 
Mexican people, for such errors tend to prevent the emigration of 
many good men who would benefit themselves greatly by a settlement 
in Texas; and also they cause remarks and illiberal reflections against 
the colonists of Texas on the one hand, or against the Mexican 
government on the other which do great harm, and foment jealousies, 
ill will, and want of confidence where there is no just foundation for 
anything of the kind. 

It is not the object of the writer of the foregoing remarks to induce 
any person to emigrate to Texas without first satisfying himself as 
to every particular connected with the subject. He wishes no one to 
leap in the dark. On the contrary his object is to induce inquiry and 
a full investigation of the matter. Europeans who feel any interest 
about Texas can no doubt obtain correct and authentic information by 
applying direct to the diplomatic agents of their respective govern¬ 
ments at the City of Mexico, who can procure copies of the national 
colonization law of 18 August, 1824, and of the law on the same sub¬ 
ject of the State of Coahuila and Texas of 24 March, 1825. Should 


132 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


a number of persons, a whole village of Germans or Dutch, for in¬ 
stance, wish to emigrate, it would be a good plan to send a special 
agent to examine the country and make all the necessary arrange¬ 
ments, and then present a detailed report of his observations to those 
who sent him. 

Europeans wishing to settle in Austin’s colony can procure every 
necessary information by applying or writing to S. F. Austin, or to 
Samuel M. Williams, who has been taken in by Austin as a partner 
in the last contract with government. Letters to those persons must 
be directed to the Town of San Felipe de Austin, Texas, and could 
be sent through some commercial house in New Orleans. 

December, 1831. 

Texas in 1833 

Number of Population. Municipality of Bexar, including 


the four missions of San Jose, San Juan, Espada, Con¬ 
cepcion, and the Ranches upon the Be jar River. 4,000 

Municipality of Goliad, including the towns of San Patricio 

and Guadalupe Victoria. 2,300 

Municipality of Gonzales. 1,600 

Municipality of Austin, including the towns of Bastrop, Mata¬ 
gorda and Harrisburg, and settlements upon the Colo¬ 
rado and San Jacinto Rivers, and the new town of 

Tenoxtitlan . 12,600 

Municipality of Liberty, including the settlements of Ana- 

huac, Galveston and Bevil. 4,500 

Municipality of Brazoria, including the town of Velasco. 4,800 

Municipality of Nacogdoches, including the settlements of 
the Ayish, Trinity, Neches, Attoyac, Tenaha, Sabine and 
Pecan Point. 16,700 


Total number of population. 46,500 1 


The wandering tribes of Indians and half civilized persons, whose 
number passes twenty thousand, are not included in this enumeration. 

Products. Those of Texas are: Cotton, sugar, tobacco, indigo, 
edible grains and vegetables of various kinds; flocks, lumber and 
boards, leather goods and hides. 

Mills. In the municipalities of Austin and Brazoria there are 
thirty cotton-gins, two steam sawmills and grist mills, six water-power 
mills, and many run by oxen and horses. 

1 The total white population in 1833 probably did not exceed twenty thou¬ 
sand. Austin was seeking in this report to induce the Mexican government to 
give Texas a separate state government, and exaggerated the population to 
show that Texas was ready for such a government. 











DESCRIPTIONS OF TEXAS IN 1828 , 1831 , AND 1833 133 


In Gonzales there is a water-power mill on the Guadalupe river 
for sawing lumber and running machinery ( mover maquims), which 
is of much importance, since this mill supplies the towns of Gonzales 
and Goliad and the city of Bexar with boards ( tablas ). 

The municipalities of Liberty and Nacogdoches are very well pro¬ 
vided with mills and gins, and there is great progress in this industry 
in all parts of Texas. 

General observations. —The planting of cotton is very general and 
well advanced in all parts, and the yield this year will be more than 
one hundred and fifty thousand arrobas ginned and clean, equal to six 
hundred thousand arrobas with the seed. 2 

The raising of cattle and hogs has increased with so much rapidity 
that it is difficult to form a calculation of their number. The price 
for which they sell will give you an idea of their abundance. 

Fat beeves of from twenty to thirty arrobas are worth from eight 
to ten dollars. Fat hogs of from eight to twelve arrobas are worth 
three and a half to five dollars each, and lard in proportion. 

Butter and cheese, corn, beans, and all kinds of vegetables abound. 

The sowing of wheat has not progressed so much, because the 
climate is not suitable for this grain in the settled region near the 
coast. 

The raising of horses and mules has progressed a good deal, 
although not in comparison to what it will do when the country is 
settled in the interior and the Indians subdued, who now make their 
raids to steal horses. 

In the Bay of Galveston there is a steamship, and a company has 
been formed in Austin and Brazoria for the purpose of bringing one 
to the Brazos river. There is also a plan to open a canal to join the 
Brazos river with the Port of Galveston, and another to join the 
two Bays of Matagorda and Galveston. 

The settled part of the country is provided with good roads and 
there are various new projects and enterprises for bettering the navi¬ 
gation of the rivers with oar-boats and steamboats for the purpose of 
facilitating the transport of the agricultural products of the interior 
of Texas to the coast. 

There are no schools or academies in Texas endowed or established 
by the state, but there are private schools in all parts and very good 
ones; and as soon as there is a local government to give form and pro¬ 
tection to education there will be much progress in this direction. 

The inhabitants of Texas are in general farmers who own their 
lands; there are few among them who do not know how to read and 
write, or who do not understand very well the importance of protect¬ 
ing their property and person by means of a local government, well 
organized and well supported. 

The fact ought to be presented that the resources and qualifications 

2 An arroba is equal to twenty-five pounds. 


134 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


of Texas to sustain a state government are augmented in the highest 
degree by the enterprising and industrious character of her inhabitants. 
Their progress is rapid, even in their present situation; but with a 
state government to enlarge and protect industry it would be much 
greater, because then there would be security and confidence, which 
do not now exist. 

Proof that the inhabitants of Texas have confidence in their re¬ 
sources to defend themselves against the Indian savages is to be found 
in the fact that they have not asked troops nor companies of soldiers 
or money, and they do not need to. 


CHAPTER XIII 


THE CHARACTER OF THE EARLY TEXANS 

Thomas White and Stephen F. Austin 

[The two letters which follow are from The Austin Papers, II, 164-165, 
197-199. White’s letter illustrates the opinion of many people in the United 
States about the colonists who went to Texas. Austin’s answer is fair and 
honest statement concerning the character of the average settlers. There are 
many letters scattered through the three volumes of The Austin Papers which 
bear out Austin’s statement. The letters given here are printed substantially as 
they were written, with little correction of grammar or spelling. 

Thomas White to Austin 

Franklin, Louisiana 31st January, 1829. 

Dear Sir: 

As I contemplate becoming a resident of Texas, I feel great solici¬ 
tude about the nature of the population which will inhabit the country. 
I have been informed that you permit no one to settle within the limits 
of your colony unless they produce vouchers sufficient to convince 
you that they possess a good moral character; indeed I beleive such 
is the law, and I was truly glad to hear that you were disposed to 
rigidly inforce it. But I am fearful you may be imposed on, for I 
do no of some very bad men who I have been told are going there. 
There are a number of criminals who after serveing in the state prisons 
who it is said when they are turned out look towards Texas. 

The planters here have a most desperate oppinion of the population 
there, orriginating I presume from such vilains as has been driven 
from among them and who have taken shelter in that province. There 
are others of my acquaintance whom I got acquainted with before I 
came to this state who I have understood are now on their way there. 
I beleive they are from Tennassee and Alabama, and I can assure 
you that I know no good of them. I do not wish to make specific 
charges, but be strict in your enquiries about character. I do not 
wish to mention names because I may see them when I arrive there. 

A Gentleman expects to leave Attakapas shortly for the purpose 
of exploreing your country. If he gives a favourable report, I shall 
certainly remove there and endeavour to carry along with me a 
numerous train of friends who I am sure you will find to be honest 
and industerous citizens and who will bring with them considerable 

135 


136 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


property. The Gentleman above alluded to feels some apprehension 
of danger of robery by persons liveing on the opposite side of the 
Sabine river from this and is waiting to get company to go with 
him. A planter told me not long since that persons who stole his 
horses fled to the Spanish country, meaning Texas. 

I mention these things to you to apprise you of the objections 
which the most respectable class of citizens have to comeing to your 
country, thinking it probable that you would adopt some means to 
have those lawles fugatives from the laws of their country driven 
away from this province. 

As it regards your Colony I have confidence in what I have heard, 
that your intention is only to admit respectable persons. But I am 
fearful that some persons haveing the appearance of gentlemen will 
impose themselves. I heard the other day of a man from New York 
who says that he is an intimate friend of Burr going to Texas. From 
what expressions which I heard he dropt I fear you will find him a 
restless sperit and perhaps a troublesome fellow. 

Will you be so good as to write me and let me know whether it 
is dangerous traveling on the other side of the sabine in consequence 
of Robbers. 

I have heard also that you have obtained an extension of your 
colony. Pray let me know at what time I could obtain land in it, as 
I was informed that it was probable it would be ready for settlement 
this winter. If that be the fact, do let me know and the terms on 
which I could obtain lands for myself and five or six other families. 

I removed to this state last year and have not purchased land yet, 
nor shall I purchase largely untill I see your country or Know more 
about it from the Gentleman who is about to visit it. 

Thomas White. 

P. S., 

I shall leave here in a few days for St Martinsville where I would 
thank you to write me. 

Since writeing the within I have been told by a gentleman that 
there is liveing near the sabine a man by the name of William Knight 
who brok geoil [jail] here and frequently crosses the river and com¬ 
mits depredations on the state of Louisiana. Would it not be wise 
to send a force and detect him in his bandit [r]y? I presume that the 
commander of the Mexican Troops at Nacogdoches would order him 
and his gang arrested if information was given of the character of 
Knight and his associates. 

[Addressed:] Colo S. F. Austin, Natchitoches Louisiana. The 
post master will be so good as to forward this to San Felipe de Austin 
Texas. 


THE CHARACTER OF THE EARLY TEXANS 137 


Austin to Thomas White 

San Felipe de Austin March 31, 1829. 

Dear Sir: 

Your letter of 31 January came to hand yesterday and I hasten 
to answer the enquiries you make relative to this country. 

You express great solicitude as to the discretion of population 
that will inhabit Texas. On this subject a mistaken idea has pre¬ 
vailed in most parts of the United States, particularly as to this 
colony. In 1822-3, when I returned from Mexico to go on with 
the colony, I found that some bad men had entered this section of 
country and I immediately adopted measures to drive them away 
which were effectual, but which drew down upon me the full force 
of the malice and enmity of all that class, and they were not idle 
in fabricating and circulating every species of falsehoods and evil 
reports about this colony which ingenuity and baseness could invent. 
They denounced me as the tyranical agent of a despotic government, 
and endeavoured to blacken the characters of the settlers here 
generally. 

The most of those who were expelled by me from here, stoped on 
the Sabine frontier or passed over into Louisiana. Many others of 
the same class who intended to have removed to this colony and were 
thus prevented, united with those who were expelled, to blow the 
clamor about this Government and to blacken every thing appertain¬ 
ing to this colony, and in this way good men have been deceived and 
even detered from removing here. I lay it down as a rule that has 
never yet had an exception, that whoever is governed by common 
rumor or report about this colony, will form erronious opinions and 
be deceived. 

I have not been understood in every instance by the people here as 
I ought to have been. They have growled and grumbled and mut¬ 
tered, without knowing why, or without being able to explain why; 
but it has not arisen from moral depravity or because the people 
are bad. On the contrary it arose from a principle which is 
common to all North Americans, a feeling which is the natural off¬ 
spring of the unbounded republican liberty enjoyed by all classes in 
the United States; that is, jealoucy of those in office, jealoucy of 
undue encroachments of personal rights, and a general repugnance to 
every thing that wore even the semblance of a stretch of power. 

This feeling is correct when properly guided by an enlightened 
judgement, capable of discriminating between a necessary and rigor¬ 
ous discharge of official duty and an abuse of it. And here, I confess, 
the people are somewhat defective, tho not more so than the mass 
of the people, “the multitude,” are in the United States. Ninety nine 
times out of one hundred, an officer who discharges his duty rigorously 
and firmly in the United States is denounced by the multitude as a 


138 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


tyrant, and he generally sinks under the denunciation, unless shielded 
by the accidental or substantial brilliancy of his acts, or by the amiable 
suavity of his manners, or by a talent to conciliate popular favor at 
the expence of candor and truth. 

The settlers of this colony taken en masse are greatly superior 
to any new country or frontier I have ever seen, and would loose 
nothing by a comparison with some of the oldest counties of many 
of the southern and western States—this I state as a positive and 
incontrovertable fact. True it is that some of them have “growled” 
at me for expelling or rejecting bad men, and they have gone so far 
as to clamor because bad men have been rigorously handled. It arose 
from a defect of judgement, and not of the heart. There is a much 
greater want of men of sound and enlightened and experienced judge¬ 
ment than of sound and pure materials to form a happy community 
in this colony, tho I will always contend that in this particular we are 
not behind the great mass of the people of the United States. In 
proportion to our numbers, we are as enlightened, as moral, as good, 
and as “law biding” men, as can be found in any part of the United 
States, and greatly more so than ever settled a frontier. 

The policy which the Mexican Government has uniformly pursued 
towards the settlers of this colony, has been that of a kind and liberal 
and indulgent parent. Favors and privileges have been showered 
upon us, to an extent that has even caused some to doubt their 
reality; and hence have arisen many vague and unmeaning suspicions 
as to the validity of our land titles etc. All such suspicions are vague 
and unmeaning and groundless. 

In the month of May, and perhaps in next month, the whole of 
the country bordering on the coast from Galveston bay to La Baca 
river on Matagorda bay will be open for settlement. No grants can 
be made nor even promises of grants, untill the person who applies 
has first removed his family and has actually become a settler. He 
cannot first pick out a place, and get a promise that it will be 
retained for him and then go back and bring out his family. And 
no one can be admitted without producing the certificates and proof 
of character required by law. 

The person you speak of called William Knight came to this colony 
some time ago, and the treatment he met with affords a pretty fair 
specimen of public sentiment here. He came here in very great 
apparent distress—stated that he had been shipwrecked and lost his 
all, etc.—he was taken by the hand a subscription was made up for 
his relief—he was clothed and fed and attended to in sickness. Our 
cabbin doors were thrown open, and the hand of liberal and generous 
hospitality was extended to him, as it is to all strangers and travellers. 
Accident discovered the gross imposture he had practiced, and nothing 
but a precipitate flight saved him from severe punishment. 

The fears you have of being robbed etc. are all groundless. I 


THE CHARACTER OF THE EARLY TEXANS 139 


will only make the remark that when you come here, you will be 
astonished to see all our houses with no other fastening than a wooden 
pin or door latch, even stores are left in this state. There is no 
such thing in the colony as a stable to lock up horses nor pens to 
guard them in; they roam in the prairies. The “Mustangs” or wild 
horses, are the only robbers that are feared. 

I thank you for the caution you give me as to the men of bad 
character who have started to this country. My intentions are to 
admit none but good men, but I have been frequently deceived, and 
no doubt shall be so very often in future, tho I shall try to guard 
against it. 

This colony is very flourishin[g], and now is the best time for 
emigration. I have certain assurances of an increase of 300 or 400 
families next fall, and the sooner you and your friends get on the 
better chance you will have of making a good selection of land. Stock 
is high and you would do well to bring out a large stock of cows in 
particular—or heiffer calves and yearlins. 

The disturbances in Mexico do not affect us here—we have nothing 
to do with them. All that is necessary here is to keep harmony 
amongst ourselves—and to work hard. 

Stephen F. Austin. 

To Mr. Thomas White 

[Addressed:] Mr. Thomas White, San Martinville, Attakapas, 
Louisiana. 


CHAPTER XIV 


LIFE IN THE EARLY SETTLEMENTS 

By Noah Smithwick 

[The selections which follow are from Noah Smithwick, The Evolution of 
a State, 12-19, 38-42 (Gammel Book Company, Austin, 1900). Smithwick wrote 
from memory at the age of ninety. He describes the life of the colonists at 
the beginning of settlement. See: Kleberg, “My Early Experiences in Texas ; 
Hinueber, “German Pioneers of Early Texas”; “Reminiscences of Mrs. Dilue 
Harris”; “Reminiscences of Captain Jesse Burnham”; J. H. Kuykendall, “Rem¬ 
iniscences of Early Texans”; Smith, “Reminiscences of Henry Smith”—all in 
the Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, I, 297-302; II, 227- 
332; IV, 85-127, 155-189; V, 12-18; VI, 236-253, 311-330; VII, 29-64; XIV, 
24 - 73 .] 

When the sickly season came on and the men began to leave, I 
again took up the line of march for Texas, this time on board a coast¬ 
ing schooner owned by parties in New Orleans, chartered by Carlysle 
and Smith and laden with supplies for the Mexican army. A steam 
tug towed us out to the mouth of the Mississippi as far as steamers 
ventured. The weather was lovely as a dream of Venice, and we 
rounded the Balize and sped away on the wings of the trade winds 
over the placid waters. We passed Galveston island in plain view. 
There was no sign of human habitation on it; nothing to give promise 
of the thriving city which now covers it. It was only noted then as 
having been the rendezvous of Lafitte and his pirates, and as such 
was pointed out to me. The trip was a delightful one and I was in 
fine spirits, when on the third day we threaded the Paso Caballo and 
ran into Matagorda bay, having made the run in a little over forty- 
eight hours, a remarkable record in those days. We cast anchor in 
the mouth of the Lavaca river, where we had calculated to find the 
Mexican troops, but the movements of the troops, as well as the gov¬ 
ernment, were very uncertain, and there were no troops, no agent, 
no one authorized to receive the goods. There was not an American 
there. The colonization law exempted from settlement all land within 
twenty-five miles of the coast, so the territory was given over to 
the Karankawa Indians, a fierce tribe, whose hand was against every 
man. They lived mostly on fish and alligators, with a man for fete 
days when they could catch one. They were the most savage looking 
human beings I ever saw. Many of the bucks were six feet in height, 
with bows and arrows in proportion. Their ugly faces were rendered 

140 


LIFE IN THE EARLY SETTLEMENTS 


141 


hideous by the alligator grease and dirt with which they were 
besmeared from head to foot as a defense against mosquitoes. They 
rowed outside to our vessel in their canoes, but Carlysle warned them 
to leave their arms on shore, enforcing the argument by the presence 
of a wicked looking little cannon, which was conspicuously pointed 
in their direction. The mate and I had made special preparations for 
their reception, having molded several pints of bullets with which to 
load the cannon, and we were eager for a chance to turn it loose 
among them, but they gave us no provocation. It was a dreary place 
for a lone stranger to land. A few Mexicans came around, but they 
spoke no English and I understood no Spanish. At length two men, 
Fulcher and McHenry, who had squatted on land six or eight miles 
up the river, sighted the schooner and came down in a dugout. They 
took me in with them and I spent my first night in Texas in their 
cabin. My first meal on Texas soil was dried venison sopped in 
honey. After having spent some months in New Orleans, where 
everything of the known world was obtainable, it looked like rank 
starvation to me, but I was adaptive. The sea voyage had sharpened 
my appetite and I was possessed of a strong set of grinders, so I set 
to and made a meal, but I was not anxious to trespass on their hospi¬ 
tality, so next morning I set out on foot for DeWitt’s colony, ten 
miles further up the Lavaca. Even at that early date there was a 
controversy between the government and colonists with regard to the 
meaning of the line of reserve, the government contending that it was 
ten leagues from the indentation of the gulf and bays and the colonists 
that it was ten leagues from the outer line of the chain of islands that 
extend around the coast. Fulcher accompanied me up to the station. 
The beautiful rose color that tinged my visions of Texas paled with 
each succeeding step. There were herds of fine, fat deer, and antelope 
enough to set one wild who had never killed anything bigger than a 
raccoon, but, to my astonishment and disgust, I could not kill one, 
though I was accounted a crack marksman; but I found it was one 
thing to shoot at a mark, the exact distance of which I knew, and 
another to hit game at an uncertain distance. 

The colonists, consisting of a dozen families, were living—if such 
existence could be called living—huddled together for security against 
the Karankawas, who, though not openly hostile, were not friendly. 
The rude long cabins, windowless and floorless, have been so often 
described as the abode of the pioneer as to require no repetition here; 
suffice it to say that save as a partial protection against rain and sun 
they were absolutely devoid of comfort. DeWitt had at first estab¬ 
lished his headquarters at Gonzales, and the colonists had located their 
land in that vicinity, but the Indians stole their horses and otherwise 
annoyed them so much, notwithstanding the soldiers, that they aban¬ 
doned the colony and moved down on the Lavaca, where they were 
just simply staying. 


142 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


The station being in the limits of the reserve, they made no pre¬ 
tense of improving it, not even to the extent of planting corn, one 
of the first things usually attended to, for the Texan Indians, unlike 
their eastern brethren, scorned to till the soil, and the few Mexicans 
scattered through the country did so only to the extent of supplying 
their own wants; so when the colonists used up the breadstuff they 
brought with them they had to do without until they raised it. This, 
however, was no very difficult matter near the coast, where there 
were vast canebrakes all along the rivers. The soil was rich and loose 
from the successive crops of cane that had decayed on it. In the fall, 
when the cane died down, it was burned off clean. The ground was 
then ready for planting, which was done in a very primitive manner, 
a sharpened stick being all the implement necessary. With this they 
made holes in the moist loam and dropped in grains of corn. When 
the young cane began to grow they went over it with a stick, simply 
knocking it down; the crop was then laid by. Game was plenty the 
year round, so there was no need of starving. 

Men talked hopefully of the future; children reveled in the novelty 
of the present; but the women—ah, there was where the situation bore 
heaviest. As one old lady remarked. Texas was “a heaven for men 
and dogs, but a hell for women and oxen.” They—the women—talked 
sadly of the old homes and friends left behind, so very far behind it 
seemed then, of the hardships and bitter privations they were under¬ 
going and the dangers that surrounded them. They had not even 
the solace of constant employment. The spinning wheel and loom 
had been left behind. There was, as yet, no use for them—there was 
nothing to spin. There was no house to keep in order; the meager 
fare was so simple as to require little time for its preparation. There 
was no poultry, no dairy, no garden, no books, or papers as nowadays 
—and, if there had been, many of them could not read—no schools, 
no churches—nothing to break the dull monotony of their lives, save 
an occasional wrangle among the children and dogs. The men at least 
had the excitement of killing game and cutting bee trees. 

It was July, and the heat was intense. The only water obtainable 
was that of the sluggish river, which crept along between low banks 
thickly set with tall trees, from the branches of which depended long 
streamers of Spanish moss swarming with mosquitoes and pregnant 
of malaria. Alligators, gaunt and grim—certainly the most hideous 
creatures God ever made—lay in wait among the moss and drift for 
any unwary creature that might come down to drink. Dogs, of which 
every well regulated family had several, were their special weakness, 
and many a thirsty canine drank and never thirsted more. This was 
not perhaps from any partiality for dog meat; on the contrary, when 
the alligator went foraging under cover of night he evinced a decided 
preference for human flesh, particularly negroes, and many blood¬ 
curdling stories were told of alligators stealing into sleeping camps 


LIFE IN THE EARLY SETTLEMENTS 


143 


and seizing an inmate. One story, in particular, I remember as being 
told by an eye-witness. A company of emigrants were camped at the 
mouth of the Brazos waiting for teams to take them up to Austin’s 
colony. One night they were aroused by piercing screams, and rush¬ 
ing to the place from whence they proceeded found a huge alligator 
making for the river, dragging a 14-year-old negro girl by the arm. 
He had crawled into a tent, where a number of persons were sleeping, 
and, whether from accident or choice I cannot say, seized the darky 
and struck a bee-line for the river, which he would have reached on 
time with his prey but for his inveterate foes, the aforesaid dogs, 
who rushed upon him and, though finding no vulnerable point of 
attack, swarmed around, harassing and delaying his retreat till the 
men pulled themselves together and came to the rescue, when, seeing 
the odds decidedly against him, his alligatorship relinquished his prize 
and sought his own safety in the river. Their bellow was just such 
a hideous sound as might be expected to issue from the throat of such 
a hideous creature, and was of itself enough to chase away sleep, 
unassisted by the tuneful mosquito, whose song, like the opera singer’s, 
has a business ring in it. I had heard the bellowing nightly while in 
New Orleans, but heard amid the noise and lights of the city there 
lurked in it no suspicion of the horror it could produce when heard 
amid the gloom and solitude of the wilderness. Wolves and owls 
added their voices to the dismal serenade. I had heard them all my 
life, but I had yet to learn the terrible significance that might attach 
to the familiar howl and hoot. The whippoorwill’s silvery notes filled 
in the interludes, but they seemed strangely out of tune amid such 
surroundings. 

Newcomers were warmly welcomed and entertained with all the 
hospitality at the command of the colonists. Sleeping accommodations 
were limited to mosquito bars, a provision not to be despised, since 
they were absolutely indispensable to sleep. The bill of fare, though 
far from epicurean, was an improvement on dried venison and honey, 
in that the venison was fresh and cooked, and Colonel DeWitt, my 
host, had bread, though some families were without. Flour was $10 
a barrel. Trading vessels came in sometimes, but few people had 
money to buy anything more than coffee and tobacco, which were 
considered absolutely indispensable. Money was as scarce as bread. 
There was no controversy about “sound” money then. Pelts of any 
kind passed current and constituted the principal medium of exchange. 

Children forgot, many of them had never known, what wheaten 
bread was like. Old Martin Varner used to tell a good story of his 
little son’s first experience with a biscuit. The old man had managed 
to get together money or pelts enough to buy a barrel of flour. Mrs. 
Varner made a batch of biscuits, which, considering the resources of 
the country, were doubtless heavy as lead and hard as wood. When 
they were done Mrs. Varner set them on the table. The boy looked 


144 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


at them curiously, helped himself to one and made for the door with 
it. In a few minutes he came back for another. Doubting the child’s 
ability to eat it so quickly, the old man followed him to see what dis¬ 
position he made of the second. The ingenious youngster had con¬ 
ceived a novel and not altogether illogical idea of their utility. He 
had punched holes through the center, inserted an axle and triumph¬ 
antly displayed a miniature Mexican cart. And I assure you, from 
my recollection of those pioneer biscuits, they were capable of sus¬ 
taining a pretty heavy load; shouldn’t wonder if that was the first 
inception of the paper car wheel. 

Game was the sole dependence of many families and I fixed up 
many an old gun that I wouldn’t have picked up in the road, knowing 
that it was all that stood between a family and the gaunt wolf at the 
door, as well as the Indians. Domestic animals were so scarce that 
the possession of any considerable number gave notoriety and name 
to the possessor; thus there were “Cow” Cooper and “Hog” Mitchell. 
Failing to secure more choice game, there were always mustangs to 
fall back on. Over on the Brazos lived Jared E. Groce, a planter from 
South Carolina, who had over ioo slaves, with which force he set to 
work clearing ground and planting cotton and corn. He hired two 
men to kill game to feed them on, and the mustangs being the largest 
and easiest to kill the negroes lived on horse meat till corn came in. 

Another type of the old colonists, but one that played a no less 
important part in the development of the country, was Thomas B. 
Bell, who lived up on the San Bernard above McNeal’s. He came 
several times to my shop during my stay at McNeal’s, and he being 
an intelligent, well-bred man, I took quite a fancy to him and gladly 
accepted an invitation to visit him. I found him domiciled in a little 
pole-cabin in the midst of a small clearing upon which was a crop 
of corn. His wife, every inch a lady, welcomed me with as much 
cordiality as if she were mistress of a mansion. There were two 
young children and they, too, showed in their every manner the effects 
of gentle training. The whole family were dressed in buckskin, and 
when supper was announced, we sat on stools around a clapboard 
table, upon which were arranged wooden platters. Beside each plat¬ 
ter lay a fork made of a joint of cane. The knives were of various 
patterns, ranging from butcher knives to pocketknives. And for cups, 
we had little wild cymlings, scraped and scoured until they looked as 
white and clean as earthenware, and the milk with which the cups 
were filled was as pure and sweet as mortal ever tasted. The repast 
was of the simplest, but served with as much grace as if it had been 
a feast, which, indeed, it became, seasoned with the kindly manners 
and pleasant conversation of those two entertainers. Not a word of 
apology was uttered during my stay of a day and night, and when 
I left them I did so with a hearty invitation to repeat my visit. It 
so happened that I never was at their place again, but was told that 


LIFE IN THE EARLY SETTLEMENTS 


145 


in the course of time the pole cabin gave place to a handsome brick 
house and that the rude furnishings were replaced by the best the 
country boasted, but I’ll venture to say that the host and hostess still 
retained their old hospitality unchanged by change of fortune. 

They were a social people these old Three Hundred, though no 
one seems to have noted the evidence of it. There were a number of 
weddings and other social gatherings during my sojourn in that sec¬ 
tion, the most notable one perhaps being the marriage of Nicholas 
McNutt to Miss Cartwright. There was a large number of invited 
guests both the families occupying prominent social positions. Jesse 
Cartwright, father of the bride, was a man in comfortable circum¬ 
stances and himself and family people of good breeding. They were 
among the very first of Austin’s colonists, Cartwright being a member 
of the first ayuntamiento, or town government, organized in Texas. 
The bridegroom was a son of the widow McNutt, also among the early 
arrivals. The family, consisting of mother, two sons and three young 
daughters, came from Louisiana, where they had been very wealthy, 
but having suffered reverses they came to Texas to recoup their for¬ 
tunes. Bred up in luxury, as they evidently had been, it was a rough 
road to fortune they chose, but they adapted themselves to the situa¬ 
tion and made the best of it. Mrs. McNutt had three brothers, the 
Welches, living on Bayou Rapid, Louisiana, whom I afterwards knew; 
she also had a sister, Mrs. Dr. Peebles living with her husband in 
San Felipe. Dr. Wells later married a Miss McNutt, and Porter 
another. But to get back to the wedding. Miss Mary Allen, daughter 
of Martin Allen, a very pretty girl and a great belle by the way, was 
bridesmaid, and John McNutt, brother of the bridegroom was grooms¬ 
man. There being no priest in the vicinity, Thomas Duke, the 
“big” alcalde, was summoned from San Felipe. The alcalde tied the 
nuptial knot in good American style, but the contracting parties had 
in addition to sign a bond to avail themselves of the priest’s services 
to legalize the marriage at the earliest opportunity. 

Among the guests present I remember Mrs. Long and her daughter 
Ann, Miss Alcorn, daughter of Elijah Alcorn, Miss Mary, daughter 
of Moses Shipman, Mrs. McNutt and daughters, none of the latter 
then grown, Captain Martin, Elliot and John Alcorn. 

The first and most important number on the program being duly 
carried out, the next thing in order was the wedding supper, which 
was the best the market afforded. That being disposed of, the floor 
was cleared for dancing. It mattered not that the floor was made 
of puncheons. When young folks danced those days, they danced; 
they didn’t glide around; they “shuffled” and “double shuffled,” 
“wired” and “cut the pigeon’s wing,” making the splinters fly. There 
were some of the boys, however, who were not provided with shoes, 
and moccasins were not adapted to that kind of dancing floor, and 
moreover they couldn’t make noise enough, but their more fortunate 


146 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


brethren were not at all selfish or disposed to put on airs, so, when 
they had danced a turn, they generously exchanged foot-gear with 
the moccasined contingent and gave them the ring, and we just liter¬ 
ally kicked every splinter off that floor before morning. The fiddle, 
manipulated by Jesse Thompson’s man Mose, being rather too weak 
to make itself heard above the din of clattering feet, we had in another 
fellow with a clevis and pin to strengthen the orchestra, and we had 
a most enjoyable time. 

One other wedding to which I was bidden was that of Dr. Angier 
and Mrs. Pickett, Mills M. Battle, I think, officiating. The wedding, 
which took place at Captain Bailey’s, was a very quiet affair, no danc¬ 
ing or other amusements being indulged in. 

Another dancing party in which I participated was at Martin 
Varner’s, near Columbia. When we were all assembled and ready 
to begin business it was found that Mose, the only fiddler around, had 
failed to come to time, so we called in an old darky belonging to 
Colonel Zeno Philips, who performed on a clevis as an accompaniment 
to his singing, while another negro scraped on a cotton hoe with a 
case knife. The favorite chorus was: 

O git up gals in de mawnin’, 

O git up gals in de mawnin’, 

O git up gals in de mawnin’, 

Jes at de break ob day, 

at the conclusion of which the performer gave an extra blow to the 
clevis while the dancers responded with a series of dexterous rat-tat- 
tats with heel and toe. 

Ah, those old memories, how they throng around me, bringing 
up forms and faces long since hidden ’neath the sod. So long ago 
the events herein narrated occurred that I question if there is now 
another person living who participated in or even has heard of them. 

Other weddings among the Old Three Hundred in that vicinity 
to which I was not fortunate enough to get an invitation were the 
daughters of William Moreton of Fort Bend, one of whom married 
Stephen Richardson, at one time partner with Thomas Davis in a store 
at San Felipe, and the other, William, son of George Huff, on San 
Bernard; Samuel Chance and Miss San Pierre, daughter of Joseph 
San Pierre. They have probably all passed away, but to their descend¬ 
ants, for such I take it there are, I extend the greeting of their 
father’s friend; may they prove worthy of such parentage. 

My associations with those worthy people were pleasant, and, had 
I been content to remain with them, much of the remainder of this 
book might never have been written. But the spirit of adventure was 
still the dominating influence and, falling in with a lot of congenial 
spirits, I forsook the ways of civilization for a time, returning no 
more to those peaceful shades. 


CHAPTER XV 


STEPHEN F. AUSTIN 

By Eugene C. Barker 

[This article, which was published in The Mississippi Valley Historical 
Review, June, 1918, was reprinted in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, 
XXII, 1-17. It gives a brief account of Austin’s problems in settling Texas 
and affords an insight into his character. For a detailed history of Austin, 
see Barker, The Life of Stephen F. Austin and The Austin Papers (4 volumes), 
published by the Government Printing Office, Washington, and the University 
of Texas Press, Austin.] 

Considering the difficulties of his task, the completeness of his 
responsibility for its accomplishment, and its far-reaching results, 
Stephen F. Austin has claims to being the greatest colonial proprietary 
in American history. 

He was born in Wythe County, Virginia, November 3, 1793, 
moved to Missouri at the age of five, spent four years (1804-1808) 
at different Connecticut schools and two at Transylvania University, 
and then, at the age of seventeen, returned to Missouri, with school¬ 
ing complete, to plunge into his father’s complex business, a part of 
which he took over in 1817. In 1813 he was elected to the territorial 
legislature of Missouri, and by successive re-elections served until 
1819; in 1815 Governor Clark gave him an adjutant’s commission in 
the Missouri militia; in 1818 he became a director in the ill-fated Bank 
of St. Louis; two years later Governor Miller appointed him judge 
of the federal circuit of Arkansas; and at the beginning of 1821 he 
was editing a newspaper at New Orleans. With training and experi¬ 
ence of such breadth and versatility and with his intimate knowledge 
of frontier life, Austin at twenty-eight was well prepared to be the 
founder and patriarchal ruler of a wilderness commonwealth. 

He embarked with his father somewhat dubiously upon the colo¬ 
nization of Texas, 1 and it was partly in obedience to his father’s dying 

1 Moses Austin to Stephen F. Austin, May 22, 1821, Austin Papers, Univer¬ 
sity of Texas: “I can now go forward with confidence and I hope and pray 
you will discharge your doubts as to the Enterprise.” Austin to Wharton, 
April 24, 1829, Austin Papers: “I myself believed that the probabilities of 
failure or success were almost equal.” 


147 


148 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


wish that he determined to continue the undertaking alone. 2 But 
having begun, he spent himself in singular devotion to the healthy 
growth of Texas and the welfare of the colonists whom his influence 
brought to the country and for whose prosperity he felt a personal 
responsibility. In moments of despondency, when particularly har¬ 
assed by public duties and anxieties, he longed for “a small farm, a 
moderate independence, and a wife,” but for the most part he had no 
time for thoughts of self. His conception of his task extended farther 
than the mere planting of a number of families in an uninhabited 
waste; it was to create there a high-toned, intelligent, prosperous, and 
happy society. 

Such an enterprise as the one I undertook in settling an uninhabited coun¬ 
try [he wrote in 1832] must necessarily pass through three regular gradations. 
The first step was to overcome the roughness of the wilderness, and may be 
compared to the labor of the farmer on a piece of ground covered with woods, 
bushes, and brambles, which must be cut down and cleared away, and the roots 
grubbed out before it can be cultivated. The second step was to pave the 
way for civilization and lay the foundation for lasting productive advancement 
in wealth, morality, and happiness. This step might be compared to the plough¬ 
ing, harrowing, and sowing the ground after it is cleared. The third and last 
and most important step is to give proper and healthy direction to public opinion, 
morality, and education ... to give tone, character, and consistency to society, 
which, to continue the simile, is gathering in the harvest and applying it to 
the promotion of human happiness. In trying to lead the colony through these 
gradations my task has been one of continued hard labor. I have been clear¬ 
ing away brambles, laying foundations, sowing the seed. The genial influences 
of cultivated society will be like the sun shedding light, fragrance, and beauty. 

Ten years of retrospect no doubt helped him to formulate this state¬ 
ment of his purpose, but it is perfectly clear that his aim was in mind 
from the beginning. To another correspondent he wrote: 

My ambition has been to succeed in redeeming Texas from its wilderness 
state by means of the plough alone, in spreading over it North American pop¬ 
ulation, enterprise and intelligence, in doing this I hoped to make the fortunes 
of thousands and my own amongst the rest. ... I think I derived more satis¬ 
faction from the view of flourishing farms springing up in this wilderness 
than military or political chieftains do from the retrospect of their victorious 
campaigns. My object is to build up, for the present as well as for future 
generations. ... I deemed the object laudible and honorable and worthy the 
attention of honorable men. 

In some ways the time was ripe for his undertaking in 1821. 
The westward movement had crossed the Mississippi and reached 
the borders of Texas, and the panic of 1819 and the reorganization 

2 Mary Austin (mother of Stephen) to Stephen F. Austin, June 8, 1821, 
Austin Papers: “he called me to his bedside and with much distress and dif¬ 
ficulty of speech beged me to tell you to take his place and if god in his wis¬ 
dom thought best to disappoint him in the accomplishment of his wishes and 
plans formed, he prayed him to extend his goodness to you and enable you 
to go on with the business in the same way he would have done.” 


STEPHEN F. AUSTIN 


149 


of the land system of the United States in 1820 cooperated to stimulate 
emigration to lands that combined the attractions of princely abun¬ 
dance, accessibility, fertility, and cheapness that amounted in effect to 
a free gift. Austin’s greatness, therefore, consists not in having over¬ 
come difficulties of transportation and communication to induce reluc¬ 
tant colonists to reclaim a distant and inhospitable land, but in the tact 
with which, on the one hand, he governed his independent western 
frontiersmen, curbing their intolerance of the “foreigner” and their 
disgust at his political ineptitude, while, on the other, he won and 
held the confidence of Mexican statesmen, soothing their fear of the 
disloyalty of the colonists and the ultimate absorption of Texas by 
the United States. Austin stated his problem in a very few words 
in a letter of 1829: 

I had an ignorant, whimsical, selfish and suspicious set of rulers over me 
to keep good natured, a perplexed, confused colonization law to execute, and 
an unruly set of North American frontier republicans to controul who felt 
that they were sovereigns, for they knew that they were beyond the arm of 
the Govt, or of law, unless it pleased them to be controuled. 

Fortunately, though it seemed to him ruinously unfortunate at 
the time, the revolution and the political upheaval incident to the 
establishment of Mexican independence carried Austin to Mexico 
in the spring of 1822, after many of his colonists had already arrived, 
and kept him there for a year securing confirmation of his grant, 
which had been made by the Spanish regime. There, during the brief 
space of eleven months, he saw the executive government go through 
the stages of a regency, an empire, and a military triumvirate. Itur- 
bide elevating himself to the imperial throne by Napoleonic methods 
and being himself overthrown by Santa Anna posing as a liberal— 
while the legislature traveled through a provisional junta gubernativa, 
a sovereign elected congress, a rump (the junta national instituyente ), 
and back again, after the fall of Iturbide, to the congress. With 
little money, and reduced at last to the extremity of selling his 
watch, Austin possessed his soul in such patience as he could and 
gently nagged a national colonization law through Iturbide’s rump 
parliament, only to have it annulled by the return of the legitimate 
congress and its sweeping decree repealing all acts of the empire. He 
had won his case, however, and congress instructed the executive 
to confirm his contract in the terms of the imperial law. Incidentally 
he had learned the language, gained the confidence and esteem of 
such men as Anastacio Bustamante, Lorenzo de Zavala, Ramos Arispe, 
and Lucas Alaman, and obtained an insight into Mexican personal 
and official character that was the key to his future success. For 
a foreigner he had exercised a remarkable influence upon the shifting 
committees of the various legislative bodies. He was largely respon¬ 
sible for the passage of the colonization law, tried his hand at drafting 


150 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


an imperial constitution which combined some of the features of the 
Constitution of the United States with the Spanish constitution of 
1812, and, on his departure, left with Ramos Arispe a document which 
probably in considerable degree shaped the acta constitutiva, the pro¬ 
visional constitution which bridged the transition from empire to fed¬ 
eral republic. 

Austin returned to Texas with extraordinary powers. The gov¬ 
ernor had already invested him with general authority to govern 
the colony until the regular state administration could be extended 
to it, and now, by decree of the national government, this power was 
more specifically defined and enlarged. He was supreme judge, save 
that in capital cases he must submit his decision to the commandant 
general of the Eastern Interior Provinces before execution; he could 
issue regulations for the government of the settlements when the 
national laws did not apply; he was commander of the militia, which 
it was his duty to keep in efficient state of organization, with the title 
of lieutenant colonel, and with authority to wage offensive and de¬ 
fensive war on the Indians; he had sole power to admit immigrants 
to or exclude them from his colony, which covered an area larger 
than Massachusetts; and, acting with a commissioner appointed by 
the governor, he could give title to married men for 4,600 acres of 
land, subject to improvement in two years, and could greatly aug¬ 
ment that amount to men with large families, or who established gins, 
sawmills, or other public conveniences. 

Most of this power Austin retained for seven years. The legis¬ 
lature, it is true, was organized in 1824, when Texas was united with 
Coahuila to the south, but, aside from passing the state colonization 
law, its attention until 1827 was centered on the formation of the 
constitution, so that there was very little legislation for Texas. A 
local ayuntamiento or municipal government was established in 1828, 
but for several years this took little of the burden of administration 
from Austin, because, though he steadily refused to accept office in 
the ayuntamiento, the members of that body looked to him for guid¬ 
ance and both state and federal authorities showed a disposition to 
hold him responsible for the smooth working of the local govern¬ 
ment, while of the land system he retained direction throughout the 
colonial period. From inclination as well as from necessity, he fol¬ 
lowed democratic methods of administration, dividing the colony into 
districts and allowing the inhabitants to elect alcaldes, or justices of 
the peace, and militia officers, himself hearing appeals from the for¬ 
mer and directing the latter. But in the matter of legislation he acted 
alone, promulgating, with the approval of the political chief at San 
Antonio, a brief civil and criminal code which was in operation for 
five years. In his management of the lands of the colony he followed 
from the beginning the practice of issuing titles only on official sur¬ 
veys and of recording in permanent form all papers connected with 


STEPHEN F. AUSTIN 


151 


the title, including the surveyor’s plot of the land. The government 
made no allowance for the expenses of administration, and in the 
early days taxation was impossible, so that, except for fees of 
alcaldes and constables, the cost of government fell heavily upon 
Austin. This was particularly true of his management of the land 
business, while he was at constant expense also in entertaining 
travelers and prospectors, sending expresses, giving presents to In¬ 
dians, and often furnishing munitions and supplies for Indian cam¬ 
paigns. 

Anticipating some of these expenses, and wishing also, naturally, 
compensation for his industry and enterprise, Austin had, before 
planting a single colonist, arranged, with the knowledge of Governor 
Martinez, to collect 12% cents an acre for the land in his grant, as¬ 
suming himself the cost of surveying land and of issuing and record¬ 
ing titles. He advertised this in plain and unambiguous terms, 
and the original settlers accepted it gladly, because elsewhere in Texas 
they had no right to settle or acquire land at all. The imperial colo¬ 
nization law of 1823, in accordance with whose terms, after its 
repeal, Austin’s grant was confirmed, greatly enlarged the headrights 
which he had planned to allow settlers and provided that he himself 
should receive as compensation for his labors some 65,000 acres for 
each two hundred families that he introduced. Whether this was 
intended to annul the I2j4 cent agreement is open to question. Aus¬ 
tin thought not, and so explained on his return from Mexico in the 
summer of 1823. Where each settler could have 4,600 acres for the 
asking, the empresario’s 65,000 acres were not likely to yield much 
ready money for current expenses. Nevertheless, some of the colo¬ 
nists now objected to the payment and carried their complaint to the 
political chief, who had replaced the governor at San Antonio, and 
he ruled against Austin’s right to charge for the lands. Instead, he 
fixed a scale of fees for the surveyor, the land commissioner, and 
the state, which Austin thought had no warrant in law. He con¬ 
tented himself, however, with making a straightforward defense of 
his reasons for charging the fee, pointing out the risks, hardships, 
sacrifices, and expenses he had suffered, and asking plainly if he had 
not given in labor and responsibility the equivalent of the 12cents 
an acre which the colonists had agreed to pay him, or whether they 
could or would have obtained anything, except through his exertions. 
Many considered themselves in equity bound by their contracts, one 
declaring that no candid man in the colony denied the obligation, but 
Austin relinquished them all and made an arrangement with Bastrop 
for a division of the fee which the political chief had prescribed for 
the latter as commissioner. It yielded much less than his contracts 
with the colonists would have done, but it avoided friction between 
them and the political chief. The colonization law which the legis¬ 
lature passed in 1825 recognized the justice of Austin’s position and 


152 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


authorized empresarios to collect a fee from their settlers in addition 
to the generous premium of land allowed by the state. 

A few of the colonists were already grumbling because they saw 
Austin granting three, four, and five leagues to some while he allowed 
them only a paltry 4,600 acres. They were ignorant of Spanish and 
knew nothing of his powers except what he or his secretary and the 
commissioner Bastrop told them. Might he not be impossing upon 
them and exploiting them for his own advantage? Had he any 
authority either to grant land or govern the colony? The political 
chief’s interference in the matter of the fees helped to strengthen their 
suspicion, and uneasy whispers increased to a respectable rumble of 
discontent. The political chief assured them that Austin’s authority 
was ample in every respect, but the excitement subsided slowly and 
did not disappear until Austin convinced the leaders of his power 
by arresting them and threatening to send them to San Antonio for 
trial. The threat and a heart to heart talk were sufficient, and they 
soon became his staunch supporters. Austin ascribed much of his 
trouble to the colonists’ ignorance of the language, their exercise of 
the sacred American right to abuse a public official, and the absence 
of definite laws. 

You know [he wrote in 1825] that it is innate in an American to suspect 
and abuse a public officer whether he deserves it or not. I have a mixed mul¬ 
titude to deal with, collected from all quarters, strangers to each other, to 
me, and to the laws and language of the country. They came here with all 
the ideas of Americans and expect to see and understand the laws they are 
governed by, . . . Could I have shown them a law defining positively the 
quantity of land they were to get and no more and a code of laws by which 
they were to be governed I should have had no difficulty—but they saw at once 
that my powers were discretionary, and that a very great augmentation to their 
grants could be made, and thus the colonization law itself and the authority 
vested in me under that law holds me up as a public mark to be shot at. . . . 

With the readiness of the colonists to “growl” and “grumble” and 
“mutter,” “without knowing why, or without being able to explain 
why,” he was not, however, disposed to quarrel. 

It arose [he said] from a principle which is common to all North Ameri¬ 
cans, a feeling which is the natural offspring of the unbounded republican 
liberty enjoyed by all classes in the United States; . . . jealousy of those in 
office, jealousy of undue encroachments on personal rights, and a general re¬ 
pugnance to everything that wore the semblance of a stretch of power. 

Another duty that brought Austin some enemies and much an¬ 
noyance was that of keeping criminals and men of bad character out 
of the colony. He required certificates of character from all who 
obtained land, and though, in the nature of things, these certificates 
could be hardly more than formal statements of “parties unknown,” 
he made remarkably few mistakes. He banished several from the 
colony in 1823 and 1824 under threat of severe corporal punishment, 


STEPHEN F. AUSTIN 


153 


and in one case applied the lash. Some of the exiles took refuge in 
the neighboring colony of the Mexican empresario De Leon and 
avenged themselves by making false reports about Austin to the gov¬ 
ernment, and others settled in the no man’s land on the borders of 
Louisiana and Arkansas and deterred honest emigrants from proceed¬ 
ing to Texas by tales of violence and anarchy. To an inquirer 
alarmed by such stories in 1829 Austin wrote, “in proportion to our 
numbers, we are as enlightened, as moral, as good, and as ‘law-abiding’ 
men, as can be found in any part of the United States, and greatly 
more so than ever settled a frontier”—an opinion whose substantial 
accuracy the historian must confirm. For, besides the supervision of 
immigrants which good policy as well as law required, the great 
majority, especially of the earlier colonists, were men of family, seek¬ 
ing homes, not speculators or adventurers. The state colonization 
law of 1825 put a premium on marriage by allowing married men 
four times as much land as unmarried men, while Austin had pre¬ 
viously required ten single men to unite into a “family” to obtain 
a league, the headright of a married man. 

It would be impossible to exaggerate Austin’s labors in the early 
years of the colony. A letter to the political chief in 1826 gives a 
clue to their character and variety. He had left San Felipe on April 
4 to point out some land recently conceded to one of the state officials 
and had been detained by excessive rains and swollen streams until 
the 29th. On May 1 he had begun the trial of an important case 
that had lasted seven days; at the same time he had had to entertain 
a delegation of the Tonka way Indians, and make preparations for a 
campaign against another tribe; to talk to and answer questions of 
many “foreigners,” who had come to look at the country, explaining 
and translating the federal constitution and some of the laws for them; 
to receive and pass upon applications for land, hear reports and issue 
instructions to surveyors; and to correspond with superior civil and 
military officers. This, the 8th, his first free day since returning, was 
mail day, and he had received two communications and dispatched 
five. Too much of his time, he once complained, was consumed in 
settling “neighborhood disputes about cows and calves,” but it was 
the patience with which he devoted himself to the minutiae of the 
colony as well as his intelligence and ability in more important things 
that accounts for his success. During these years he gathered by 
painstaking surveys and personal observations data for a map of 
Texas, published by Tanner in 1829; charted Galveston Bay and the 
several harbors and navigable rivers of the state; promoted trade 
with the United States and kept a stream of immigrants flowing into 
the colony; encouraged the erection of gins and sawmills and the 
establishment of schools; and exercised throughout a most remark¬ 
able influence over the legislature at Saltillo in matters affecting the 
interest of the colony. To mention but a few instances of this, he was 


154 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


responsible in considerable degree for the liberal terms of the colo¬ 
nization law, his arguments prevented the constitutional abolition of 
slavery in 1827 and secured the labor law of the next year permit¬ 
ting the continued introduction of slaves in the form of indented 
servants, and in 1829 his desire to protect the colonists against suit 
for debts contracted before coming to the country found expression 
in what we should now consider a sweeping homestead law. He him¬ 
self was a member of the legislature in 1831-1832, and was re-elected 
in 1834 but was prevented from serving by his detention in Mexico. 

Burdened as he was with the affairs of his own colony, he found 
time to answer the calls of others. He repeatedly exerted himself to 
obtain titles for families who had drifted in and settled on the eastern 
border of the province before the passage of the colonization law; 
and he was always ready to give other empresarios the benefit of his 
knowledge and experience. DeWitt was deeply indebted to him for 
such success as he enjoyed, Burnet drew heavily upon him, and Ed¬ 
wards received advice that ought to have saved him from the folly of 
the Fredonian rebellion. He perceived very clearly the mutual in¬ 
terest of all in the peaceful and rapid development of Texas, and, 
with the field so vast and the laborers so few, he welcomed every 
additional effort in the promotion of that end. Some of his fellow- 
empresarios, however, without his vision and interest in the perma¬ 
nent growth of the country, doubted his sincerity and blamed him 
for embarrassments and failures due to their own impatience, greed, 
and unwillingness to adapt themselves to Mexican racial characteristics 
and sensibilities. What was needed in Texas he said was 

men, . . . not open mouthed politicians, nor selfish visionary speculators, nor 
jealous ambitious declamitory demagogues who will irritate the public mind 
by inflamitory criticisms about temporary evils and by indulging in vague sur¬ 
mises.. We need men of enlightened judgement, disinterested prudence, and 
reflection, with a great stock of patience, unshaken perseverance and integrity 
of purpose. Men who will calmly put their shoulders to the wheel and toil 
for the good of others as well as for their own, and who will be contented to 
rise with the country without [trying] to force it forward prematurely to over¬ 
top the genl. level of prosperity by undue individual advancement. A band 
of such men firmly linked together by the bonds of mutual confidence and 
unity of purpose and action could and would make Texas the garden of North 
America. 

He did not, of course, as we have seen, escape misconstruction 
by his own colonists, but this he philosophically recognized as in¬ 
evitable, and even necessary, in a way to the success of the colony. 

To have been universally popular amongst the settlers for the first two or 
three years [he said] would have endangered all, for it would have excited 
vague jealousies in the [fear?] alone that I was conciliating popular favor in 
order to wield it in a particular way. To have been universally unpopular 
endangered all in another way, for it would have totally destroyed that degree 
of popular confidence and character abroad which was necessary to draw emi- 


STEPHEN F. AUSTIN 


155 


gration and it would also have deprived me of the power of controuling the 
settlers sufficiently to have prevented them from destroying themselves. . . . 
The reflecting and worthy part of the settlers have always adhered to me 
firmly throughout. [The other class] abused me over their grog and at times 
have had weight enough to require humoring and management to keep within 
bounds, but they effectually removed all suspicion that I was courting the favor 
of a rabble for the purpose of wielding it, and in this way they did me and 
the colony a service, though without knowing or intending it, and I used their 
abuse of me to advance the public good and establish myself more firmly in 
the confidence of my rulers. 

He was conservative in declaring that the “reflecting and worthy part 
of the settlers” adhered to him, and they were always a vast majority. 
They brought him their personal troubles and perplexities, and sur¬ 
rendered completely to his guidance in every crisis through which the 
colony passed. This was true in 1826, when he led them against 
Edwards’s rebellious “frontier republicans” at Nacogdoches; in 1829, 
when he obtained the exemption of Texas from President Guerrero’s 
emancipation decree; in 1830, when he reconciled them to the federal 
decree limiting immigration from the United States, while taking 
steps to secure its suspension; in 1832, when, after the expulsion of 
Bustamante’s garrisons from Texas during his absence, he convinced 
Colonel Mexia of their loyalty to the liberal party of Santa Anna; 
in 1833, when they petitioned for the separation of Texas and Coa- 
huila and sent him to Mexico to urge its approval; and, finally, in 
1835, when they resisted Santa Anna’s encroachments on republican 
government, for without his advice and organizing influence very few 
would have been ready then to take up arms. The revolution once 
begun, he was called to the command of the army, much as Wash¬ 
ington went to Cambridge, to quiet the claims of rival aspirants, and 
when order was established and the campaign under way they sent 
him to the United States to find money and munitions to maintain it. 

His control of the settlers in every essential movement as they 
increased from a few hundred in 1821 to many thousands in 1835 
proves him a great leader. The confidence of Mexican officials, 
despite their innate fear of Anglo-American expansion, which was 
constantly stimulated by the efforts of the United States to acquire 
Texas, proves him a diplomat of no mean ability. With both, his 
success was due to his absolute honesty and fearless candor. 

His one purpose was the advancement of Texas. “I feel,” he 
said only a few months before his death, “a more lively interest for 
its welfare than can be expressed—one that is greatly superior to 
all pecuniary or personal views of any kind. The prosperity of Texas 
has been the object of my labors, the idol of my existence—it has 
assumed the character of a religion for the guidance of my thoughts 
and actions for fifteen years.” He sincerely believed until the begin¬ 
ning of 1836 that the best interest of Texas lay in its loyalty to 
Mexico, that the colonists and the government had, therefore, a com- 


156 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


mon interest in its development, and he was the efficient apostle of 
that faith. He felt some fear of the outcome of republican govern¬ 
ment in Mexico, he knew that the people were not fitted for it, but 
hoped they might stumble along until education and experience pre¬ 
pared them for it. At the same time, as a prudent man would in 
his position, he sometimes contemplated a condition of anarchy or 
oppression that would render continued loyalty impossible. In such 
a contingency, though he shrank from it, he favored independence; 
never, until shortly before his death, annexation to the United States. 

As an “independent speck in the galaxy of nations” [he wrote in 1829] 
Europe will gladly receive our cotton and sugar, etc., on advantageous terms 
in exchange for “untariffed” manufactured articles. We should be too con¬ 
temptible to excite the jealousy of the Northern Mammoth, and policy and 
interest would induce Europe to let us alone. I deem it more than probable 
that the great powers would all unite in guaranteeing the Independence of 
little Texas. There are many powerful reasons why it should be to their 
interest to do it. 

On his attitude toward annexation there is an abundance of material 
from 1830 to 1835, and there can be no doubt of his sincerity. This 
conclusion does not rest alone on an interpretation of Austin's own 
statements, for in 1834 Anthony Butler attributed to him his failure 
to buy Texas. Two reasons for opposing annexation Austin gives, 
the land system of the United States and slavery. 

If that Govt, should get hold of us and introduce its land system, thousands 
who are now on the move and who have not yet secured their titles would be 
totally ruined. The greatest misfortune that could befall Texas at this moment 
would be a sudden change by which any of the emigrants would be thrown 
upon the liberality of the Congress of the United States of the North. 

This he wrote to his brother-in-law in 1830. A few months later 
he wrote that he should “oppose a union with the United States with¬ 
out some guarantees, amongst them I should insist on the perpetual 
exclusion of slavery from this country.” No doubt the tariff figured 
in his consideration, and it is evident, too, that he believed that a 
strong population in Texas would ultimately wield such an influence 
with the government as to be freer under Mexico than under the 
United States. 

Austin’s views on slavery, despite the quotation just read, and a 
number of other expressions equally unequivocal, require explanation. 
He successfully opposed constitutional emancipation in 1827, urged 
in vain at the same time that immigrants be permitted to continue 
bringing slaves from the United States, obtained the withdrawal of 
Guerrero’s emancipation decree in 1829, and declared in 1835 that 
Texas must be a slave state. The contradiction is more apparent 
than real, but when all is said some inconsistency remains. The truth 
seems to be that he did deplore slavery, but that he recognized its 
economic necessity in the development of Texas. Most of his colo- 


STEPHEN F. AUSTIN 


157 


nists were naturally to be expected from the neighboring slaves states, 
but slave owners would not come if forbidden to bring their slaves, 
and others who did come would be greatly hampered by the lack of 
free labor. About the time of this letter he seems to have felt that 
a satisfactory compromise might be reached by the labor law of 1828, 
which, in effect, established the peonage system of Mexico. He wrote 
in 1831: 

Negroes can be brought here under indentures, as servants, but not as slaves. 
This question of slavery is a difficult one to get on with. It will ultimately 
be admitted, or the free negroes will be formed by law into a separate and 
distinct class —the laboring class. Color forms a line of demarkation between 
them and the whites. The law must assign their station, fix their rights and 
their disabilities and obligations—something between slavery and freedom, but 
neither the one nor the other. Either this or slavery in full must take place. 
Which is best? Quien sabe? It is a difficult and dark question. 

In 1832 the labor law was modified, limiting contracts thereafter to 
ten years, hence, perhaps, his declaration for slavery in 1835. His de¬ 
fense of existing slavery in 1826-1827, it should be added, was based 
on what he considered guaranteed vested right, his original contract 
with the Spanish government, under which his first families were in¬ 
troduced, having recognized slavery by augmenting a settler’s head- 
right in proportion to the number of slaves he owned. 

I have tried to present in this short paper something of the per¬ 
sonality of Austin as he revealed himself in his work. He was a 
grave, gentle, kindly man, charitable, tolerant, affectionate and loyal, 
naturally impulsive but restrained by habit, sensitive, lonely, and given 
too much, perhaps, to introspection. He enjoyed social companionship, 
but his position set him apart from the colonists and made close 
friendships with them difficult and rare. He smoked, danced now and 
then, loved music (he played the flute in his younger days), and his 
bills show occasional charges for whiskey, brandy, and wine. He was 
well educated, widely read for his opportunities, and a clear thinker. 
His letters in their straightforward precision and naturalness remind 
one of Franklin. He worked incessantly, unselfishly, and generally 
most patiently. In short, he appears to me a lovable human character, 
with many charming qualities. 

On returning from his mission to the United States in the sum¬ 
mer of 1836 he was persuaded to be a candidate for the presidency. 
He consented with indifference and took his defeat by Houston with 
equanimity. He had been absent from the country for the better part 
of three years on public business, part of the time in a Mexican 
prison; his personal affairs were greatly neglected, and he welcomed 
the prospect of leisure to put them in order. However, when his 
victorious rival asked him to be secretary of state, he consented, in 
the belief that he could be useful in bringing the infant republic to 
the favorable notice of older governments. As usual, he immersed 


158 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


himself in public duties to the utter neglect of self, and died from 
overwork and exposure on December 27, 1836. For fifteen years he 
had held the destiny of Texas in the hollow of his hand, and char¬ 
acteristically his last conscious thought was of its welfare. He waked 
from a dream thinking that the United States had recognized its in¬ 
dependence, and died in that belief. His death, thus, at the age of 
only forty-three, on the eve of the fruition of all his labors, with 
the country redeemed from the wilderness and others assuming the 
burden of responsibility that had deprived him of home, wife, and 
family, was one of fate’s grim ironies—a distressing personal tragedy. 


CHAPTER XVI 


THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 

By Eugene C. Barker 

[This chapter, somewhat abbreviated, is from the writer’s Mexico and 
Texas, 1821-1835. (P. L. Turner Company, Dallas.) It traces in brief the 
development of the Texas Revolution from 1830 to the battle of Gonzales. For 
a more comprehensive treatment of the causes of the revolution, see the volume 
from which this chapter is taken and some of the references given below. 

Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapter XVI; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A 
School History of Texas, Chapter VI; Barker, The Life of Stephen F. Austin, 
Chapters X, XII-XVI; Howren, “Causes and Origin of the Decree of April 
6, 1830,” in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XVI, 378-422; Rowe, “The 
Disturbances at Anahuac in 1832,” in Quarterly of the Texas State Historical 
Association, VI, 265-299; Turner, “The Mejia Expedition,” in the same, VII, 
1-28; Barker, “The Journal of the Permanent Council,” in the same, VII, 
250-278; Rather, Translation of Austin’s “Explanation to the Public concern¬ 
ing the affairs of Texas,” in the same, VIII, 232-258; and much correspondence 
in Barker (ed.), The Austin Papers, II, III. Volume II is published by the 
Government Printing Office (1928) as Report of the American Historical 
Association for 1922, Volume II. Volume III is published by the University of 
Texas Press (1927)]. 

The Law of April 6, 1830 .—The Law of April 6, 1830, was a 
turning point in the relations of the colonists and the government. 
On the one side, its passage marked the culmination of the govern¬ 
ment’s slowly crystallizing conviction that the policy of allowing un¬ 
restricted immigration from the United States was a dangerous error. 
On the other side, in spite of Austin’s efforts to persuade the colo¬ 
nists that there was much good in the law, I am convinced that it 
gave the first serious shock to Austin’s confidence in the good will 
of the government and in the possibility of bringing Texas to a satis¬ 
factory state of development under Mexican domination. 

Just a year before the passage of the law Austin wrote William 
H. Wharton that immigrants from the United States would find it 
“to their interests to be inhabitants of Texas as Mexican citizens. 
The policy of this govt to emigrants,” he continued, “is liberal be¬ 
yond parallel. An immense coasting trade is open round the Gulf 
of Mexico and to the West Indies, and Europe will turn with joy 
and avidity from the 'tariffed cotton’ of the U. S. to the fine long 
staple of Texas.” The need of Texas, he said, was men. “A band 
of such men [as he described] firmly linked together by the bonds 

159 


160 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


of mutual confidence and unity of purpose and action could and 
would make Texas the garden of North America. ,, The day after 
Austin received a copy of the law he wrote General Teran that he 
looked upon it as the beginning of all the evils with which the imagi¬ 
nation could afflict Texas. “My objects in coming to Texas,” he 
went on, “were sound and pure, most pure. I have labored in good 
faith. It has been the idol of my ambition to wrest this country 
from the wilderness and to add by that means to the prosperity, the 
wealth, and the moral and physical resources of the republic which 
I have adopted for my country. My motto has been fidelity and 
gratitude to Mexico. It has been the motto of all my colony. Now 
it seems that our loyalty and our labors are about to receive a reward 
from the national government and that our reward is to be destruc¬ 
tion.” 

Austin’s attitude was important. Until 1828, when constitutional 
government was inaugurated, he controlled the local government and 
shaped public opinion in Texas. Thereafter he was the popular 
balance-wheel, not always able to effect what he wanted but usually 
able to defeat any movement that he strongly disapproved. His hope 
revived when Teran accepted the strained construction of the law 
that permitted colonists to settle under his own and DeWitt’s con¬ 
tracts; he continued the practice of minimizing the annoyances and 
exalting the benefits of Mexican policy; but there are many indica¬ 
tions that he never again felt himself on sure ground. There was 
a question in his mind—how long could Texas endure the chronic 
instability and caprice of the Mexican government? How long ought 
it to endure them? Austin’s dearest hope after 1830, I think—his 
most permanent aim—was to prevent a premature insurrection and 
to hold the situation in check until Texas could grow strong enough 
to take care of itself; for it is clear beyond doubt that he did not 
at that time favor annexation to the United States. 

The immediate menace of the law to the peace of the colonists 
lay in the measures taken to enforce it. During the summer of 1830, 
as we have already seen, General Teran encircled the settlements with 
a ring of garrisons. To the strong posts at San Antonio and Nacog¬ 
doches he added considerable establishments at the head of Gal¬ 
veston Bay, at the mouth of the Brazos, at the Brazos crossing of 
the Bexar-Nacogdoches road, on the Lavaca, and on the Nueces. 
The object of these military establishments was to prevent violation of 
the law through the entrance of unauthorized immigration from the 
United States, to prevent smuggling through Texas ports to the in¬ 
terior Mexican states, and to begin Teran’s policy of military coloniza¬ 
tion. The mere presence of the troops would have been a source of 
exasperation to the colonists, who could not forget that in the years 
of their weakness, when a few resident companies would have been 
welcome, they were compelled to bear the brunt of Indian fighting 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 161 


without assistance. Now that they had the Indians under measurable 
control and were growing strong, they could view the new garrisons 
only as instruments of potential interference with their local interests 
and of their own subjection to the central government. 

Teran was quite aware of the sensitive elements in the situation 
and tried to impress upon his commanders the great need of caution 
in all their proceedings. They were to maintain rigid discipline; were 
to cultivate cordial relations with the settlers, particularly by buying 
necessary supplies from them; and were to cooperate punctiliously 
with local civil officers in all matters which might be regarded as 
touching the civil jurisdiction. One is tempted to speculate upon what 
might have happened had all Teran’s commanders been Mexicans, 
because the Mexican officers in Texas seem to have been uniformly 
men of discretion, and with the possible exception of Colonel Piedras, 
at Nacogdoches, the colonists respected and liked them. Unfor¬ 
tunately the garrison at Anahuac, on Galveston Bay, was commanded 
by an American, Colonel John Davis Bradburn. Perhaps because he 
was an American, dealing with his fellow-countrymen, Bradburn was 
less tactful than the Mexican officers. Perhaps trouble would have 
developed at Anahuac anyway, for in some ways the situation was 
more difficult in East Texas than elsewhere. Whatever might be the 
truth as to these matters of speculation, the evidence indicates that 
Bradburn was puffed up with his own authority and that his dis¬ 
position was autocratic and domineering. 

Troubles at Anahuac .—Trouble began to develop in February, 
1831, when J. Francisco Madero, a special land commissioner, arrived 
on the lower Trinity River with instructions from the governor to 
issue land titles to the scattered settlers in that region and to those 
farther east between Nacogdoches and the Sabine. Most of these 
settlers had drifted into the country at different times since 1821 and 
had “squatted” in the border and coast reserves, outside the limits 
of any empresario grant. To get titles in these areas it was necessary 
for them to have the approval of both the state and general govern¬ 
ments. Such approval was obtained in 1828, but various interruptions 
had occurred and the settlers, some of whom had made valuable im¬ 
provements, were still without titles. It is easy to picture in our 
minds the relief and satisfaction with which these precarious occu¬ 
pants hailed Madero’s arrival. All that they possessed in the world 
was at stake. It is easier still to imagine their chagrin and disappoint¬ 
ment when Bradburn arrested Madero and his surveyor on the ground 
that the issuance of titles to these settlers would be a violation of 
the Law of April 6, 1830. Madero protested that both federal and 
state governments had approved the petitions of these settlers for 
land and that it was not his intention to issue titles to any who had 
come in since the passage of the fatal law, if any such there were, 
but Bradburn remained obdurate and Madero must perforce yield. 


162 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


In the meantime, Austin, foreseeing the clash between Bradburn 
and Madero from afar, was warning his settlers not to allow their 
sympathies to involve them in the conflict. “Those are matters be¬ 
tween the interested parties and the Govt, with which my colony 
ought to have nothing to do in any shape, manner, or form. My 
colony has cleared away the rude asperities of the wilderness—made 
Texas known—given it a station in geography—a plan, and a dis¬ 
tinguished one in the class of desirable countries, and has demon¬ 
strated its value by developing its resources. In doing this, it has 
done enough to aid others who now wish to settle in the country. 
... Be mere lookers on—say nothing—give no opinions—no advice 
—take no part—have nothing to do with the matter at all.” “That 
colony,” he explained, “is the heart of Texas; keep all sound there, 
and we shall gain the confidence of the Govt, and save the country.” 
At the same time he tried to calm the disappointed settlers in East 
Texas. Another day would come; they could not better the situa¬ 
tion by violence and rebellion. “What the people on the Trinity ought 
to say,” he advised, “is that they cannot and ought not to take any 
part in any quarrel between any two officers or authorities, unless 
officially called on to do so by the competent superior authorities. 
If they take sides, they will in the end be kicked by both sides as a 
person who inter-meddles in a quarrel between man and wife.” 

Bradburn increased his own unpopularity by altercations with 
various inhabitants of the district and by annulling the local ayunta- 
miento set up by Madero at Liberty, but for a short time, toward the 
end of 1831, attention was diverted from him by the doings of the 
tariff collector, newly arrived in Texas. 

Mexico's tariff administration during the period of this study 
is an abstruse and intricate subject. The same may be said of its 
whole fiscal system. The facts as to tariff administration in Texas, 
so far as I know them, can be briefly stated. The first, and for many 
years the only, legal port in Texas was that of San Bernard, estab¬ 
lished by royal decree in 1805. The king’s proclamation was re¬ 
affirmed by the Spanish Cortes in 1820; but there was no custom 
house at the mouth of the San Bernard, there were no port officers, 
and really no fixed point of entry. Ships having business in Texas 
after the beginning of Anglo-American colonization used any con¬ 
venient shore for landing and taking on goods. In February, 1825, 
Austin petitioned for the legalization of the port of Galveston, which 
he described as the best harbor on the Texas coast and as affording 
convenient access to the settlements on the Colorado, Brazos, and 
San Jacinto. About a year later Austin acknowledged a letter notify¬ 
ing him that the government had established the port of Galveston 
provisionally. What was meant by “provisionally” is not explained. 
In the meantime, Austin had become convinced that the mouth of 
the Brazos was a more suitable site for a custom house than the rela- 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 163 


tively inaccessible Galveston Island, without timber and with insuffi¬ 
cient water; but although he repeatedly begged for the legalization 
of the Brazos, no attention was given to his petition. 

A federal act of September 29, 1823, exempted the colonists from 
the payment of duties for seven years, and, in spite of the need of 
port officers to issue clearances and perform other routine functions, 
the government made no move to establish customs officials in Texas 
until near the expiration of the term of exemption. The exemption 
would expire in September, 1830. In May of that year an interesting 
adventurer who called himself George Fisher appeared in Texas as 
collector of the port of Galveston. As there was neither a custom 
house nor other improvement on the island, Fisher announced that 
he would establish his office temporarily at the mouth of the Brazos. 
Since the Texans were as yet still exempt from paying duty on goods, 
for their own consumption, Fisher’s task would be confined to col¬ 
lecting tonnage dues on vessels entering his jurisdiction, to issuing 
clearances, and to preventing the introduction of goods intended for 
trading with the inhabitants of the interior states who did not 
enjoy the privilege previously accorded the colonists of using duty¬ 
free goods. 

Fisher was a busy-body, and showed every disposition to exalt 
his office, but General Teran temporarily suspended the order for the 
establishment of the custom house before he had time to do more 
than make a few preliminary flourishes of his authority. The ayunta- 
miento of San Felipe unhappily seized the opportunity to obtain a 
secretary who wrote English and Spanish with the same voluble 
fluency in a firm, beautiful hand and employed Fisher. A few months 
later the ayuntamiento dismissed him for abstracting documents from 
the archives for the purpose, it was believed, of involving the Texans 
in the party politics that were rending Mexico. The incident is im¬ 
portant because it infuriated Fisher and lost him the respect of the 
Texans. As a consequence, when he returned to his duties as tariff 
administrator a year later and issued certain arbitrary and oppressive 
regulations, the colonists suspected him of venting personal spleen 
and were less submissive than they probably otherwise would have 
been. 

Fisher returned to Texas in November, 1831. During his absence 
Bradburn had established the military post at Anahuac, and there 
Fisher took up his quarters. Though we have no copy of Fisher’s 
objectionable regulations, it is evident from other documents that he 
required shipmasters who entered the Brazos and other unlegalized 
ports to obtain clearances from him at Anahuac before sailing. Com¬ 
pliance with the order by captains in the Brazos would have entailed 
much delay and a tiresome trip by land of more than a hundred miles, 
to Anahuac and back. They determined not to comply. At the end 
of December, 1831, two vessels sailed from the Brazos, despite the 


164 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


efforts of a small guard at Brazoria to detain them. One of the 
soldiers was wounded. Evidently a considerable proportion of the 
population of Brazoria participated in the excitement, some of which 
appears to have been due to the interested efforts of men engaged in 
the business of importing goods illegally for trade with the interior. 
Austin happened to be there. He regarded Fisher’s order as utterly 
impracticable, and in the hope of preventing a clash, advised the guard 
to let the ships go—an act which seemed to identify him with the 
rioters and one which gave him some embarrassment in a subsequent 
correspondence with General Teran. 

Though justly angry at the attack on the guard, Teran’s decision 
was moderate and fair. He gave orders that the tonnage dues on 
the delinquent vessels must be paid by the owners of the goods that 
the vessels had landed. If the same ships again entered a Texas port 
with the same crews and the same registry, they were to be detained 
until they surrendered for trial those implicated in wounding the 
soldier. He had intended to have a branch of the Galveston, or Ana- 
huac, custom house at Brazoria, and but for contrary winds the deputy 
for the Brazoria office would have arrived before the riot. Teran 
wrote Fisher that his order was very imprudent and ill-judged. “I 
have always believed,” he said, “that administration must be reason¬ 
able, and that those only should go to Anahuac who would be equally 
inconvenienced by going to Brazoria. . . . Your imprudence will cause 
us much trouble.” A few months later, at Fisher’s request, Teran 
relieved Fisher from duty and turned over the administration of the 
custom house to Francisco Duclor, the deputy at Brazoria. 

The general attitude of the Texans toward the tariff may be in¬ 
ferred from a petition which the ayuntamiento of San Felipe adopted 
in February, 1832, asking for a renewal of their former exemption 
for an additional five years. The commodities for which the petitioners 
begged admission duty-free formed an impressive and comprehensive 
list—“all food stuffs; iron and steel; machinery; agricultural imple¬ 
ments; tools, hardware; ironware; nails; wagons and carts; cotton 
bagging and packing rope; coarse, ready-made clothing, shoes, and hats 
for the laboring and agricultural classes; general household and kitchen 
furniture introduced by incoming immigrants or for the use of the 
colonists; chewing tobacco in small quantities until the government 
is prepared to sell tobacco from the public store; lead, powder, and 
ammunition for the use of the local inhabitants; medicine; books, 
paper, and stationery.” “These articles,” it was explained, “are too 
bulky to smuggle into the interior and no general injury can be done 
the treasury by granting the petition for exemption.” The petition 
was repeated in substance by the conventions of 1832 and 1833 and the 
subject was urged by Austin during his mission to Mexico as agent of 
the second convention, but without effect. In the meantime, Duclor 
abandoned his office in September, 1832, saying that it was impossible 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 165 


for him to collect duties. Thereafter, until the spring of 1835, the 
tariff administration in Texas is shrouded in darkness. During the 
interval there may have been some collection of tonnage dues by local 
civil officers, but, if so, such collections were intermittent and capri¬ 
cious. 

The attack on Anahuac .—We must return now to Bradburn. 
From the mass of contemporary material touching Bradburn’s im¬ 
prudences certain charges stand out: (1) He pressed supplies for 
his garrison, and used slave labor, without compensating the owners, 
in erecting military buildings; (2) he encouraged a spirit of revolt 
among the slaves by telling them that it was the intent of the law to 
make them free; (3) he harbored two runaway slaves from Louisiana, 
enlisted them in his detachment, and refused to surrender them to 
the owner, who demanded them; (4) he arrested several of the colo¬ 
nists on various pretexts and held them in the guard house for military 
trial. 

It was the arrests which brought the storm upon Bradburn. Pat¬ 
rick C. Jack organized a military company, and was arrested on some 
pretext that is not clear. Bradburn no doubt believed that the organ¬ 
ization was a potential menace to himself and his garrison. William 
B. Travis undertook, as an attorney, to recover the two Louisiana 
slaves, and found himself in the guard house with Jack. Other ar¬ 
rests followed—in one instance, apparently, because the victim played 
a practical joke on Bradburn. 

The detention of Travis and Jack seems to have been long and 
aggravated. Both were prominent and popular, and on June 4 a 
force started from Brazoria to release them. On the way to Anahuac 
it grew to a hundred and sixty men and many others among the 
settlers of East Texas were ready to join them. After some skir¬ 
mishing, Bradburn agreed to release the prisoners, and the attackers 
withdrew to a camp some distance from Anahuac to await them. 
Thereupon Bradburn strengthened his position and defied the in¬ 
surgents. Thinking it unwise to attack again without artillery, they 
sent to Brazoria for two cannon, and while waiting for them adopted 
a declaration that they were not rebelling against Mexico, but were 
simply cooperating with Santa Anna in the Liberal revolt that he was 
leading at the time against Bustamante. A few days after they 
adopted this declaration, known as the Turtle Bayou Resolutions, 
Colonel Piedras moved from Nacogdoches with a considerable force 
and began negotiations with them. The conferences resulted in 
Piedras’s agreeing to have the prisoners released to the civil authori¬ 
ties for trial, to pay for the private property that Bradburn had 
appropriated, and to endeavor to have Bradburn removed from his 
command. The third, and most important, section of the agreement 
he tactfully carried out by inducing Bradburn to ask to be relieved. 
A few days afterwards the garrison at Anahuac declared for Santa 


166 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Anna, under the inspiration of a visiting Colonel Subaran, and sailed 
away to join the Liberal army. 

The Battle of Velasco .—In the meantime, a sharp battle had been 
fought at the mouth of the Brazos, where Colonel Ugartechea at¬ 
tempted to prevent the departure of the vessel carrying the cannon 
to the insurgents at Anahuac. Both the Mexicans and the colonists 
suffered severely before the exhaustion of Ugartechea’s ammunition 
compelled him to surrender and agree to withdraw his soldiers from 
Texas. 

Efforts to restore peace .—Austin was absent when these troubles 
developed. He had gone to Saltillo in March to serve in the legis¬ 
lature of Coahuila and Texas, and after the adjournment of the legis¬ 
lature he had gone to Tamaulipas to confer with General Teran. 
Reports of the movements in Texas began to reach him at Matamoras. 
Following his custom in circumstances of popular disturbance, he dis¬ 
patched an avalanche of letters, trying on the one side to quiet the 
colonists, and on the other seeking to convince the authorities that 
the colonists were not disloyal to Mexico but were simply protesting 
against unbearable abuses of which the government did not know and 
for which it was not responsible. In this instance he attributed the 
situation to Bradburn’s imprudence, and all contemporary testimony 
indicates that his explanation was well within the facts. It was the 
opinion of Colonel Piedras, who conferred with the insurgents, that 
the attack on Anahuac was a personal demonstration against Brad- 
burn with no political significance. Ramon Musquiz, the political chief 
at San Antonio, arrived at the same conclusion after an extensive 
observation of the settlements. And General Teran’s information 
gave him the same impression. He wrote Austin on June 25, 1832: 
“I have received notice of a disturbance at Anahuac against Brad- 

burn.Ugartechea seems to be much better received, and I have 

instructed him to put himself in complete accord with you. The 
affairs of Texas are understood by none but you and me, and we 
alone are the only ones who can regulate them; but there is time 
to do no more than calm the agitations, something which can be readily 
accomplished because the objects for which they contend are definite 
and well defined.” 

A week later one of the only two men who understood the affairs 
of Texas was dead. Teran, in a desperate fit of depression, fell upon 
his sword and took his own life; and Austin, the other man who 
knew his Texas, was soon driven far from his well-tried policy of 
holding Texas aloof from Mexican party wars. On the first of July 
he wrote in italics: “The course for the people there to take in the 
present distracted state of the nation is to declare that they will take 
no part in the civil war at all—that they will do their duty strictly as 
Mexican citizens—that they will adhere to Mexico and to the general 
and state constitutions, and resist any unjust attacks upon either by 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 167 

any or by all parties no matter who they may be.” He knew the 
wisdom of this advice from ten years of observation and experience. 

The Texans declare for Santa Anna in 1832 .—The same letter that 
carried this admonition to the colonists told of the evacuation of Mata- 
moros by government troops under Colonel J. M. Guerra and of the 
immediate occupation of the city by Colonel Jose Antonio Mexia with 
Santa Anna’s forces. On July 6 Guerra and Mexia signed an armi¬ 
stice and agreed to unite their forces to suppress the insurgent move¬ 
ment in Texas. Mexia having the superior force, elected to command 
the expedition to Texas—an evidence of good politics. Both Guerra 
and Mexia requested Austin to accompany the Texan expedition, and 
he gladly consented, assuring them at the same time that the move¬ 
ment in Texas was not actuated by disloyalty to Mexico but by per¬ 
sonal resentment of the arbitrary conduct of Bradburn. 

On July 16 Mexia, with four hundred men, anchored off the 
mouth of the Brazos in the brig of war Santa Anna, and sent in to 
John Austin, one of the insurgent leaders, the following letter: 

I have the honor to enclose you a copy of the convention entered into 
between the commandant in chief of Matamoros and myself on the 6th of the 
present month. This document will inform you of the motives which brought 
me to Texas, and what would have been my course had the late movements 
here been directed against the integrity of the national territory. But if, as 
I have been assured by respectable citizens, the past occurrences were on 
account of the colonists having adhered to the plan of Vera Cruz, and I am 
officially informed of that fact in an unequivocal manner, you can in that case 
assure the inhabitants that I will unite with them to accomplish their wishes, 
and that the forces under my command will protect their adhesion to said plan. 

Certainly this letter was not playing the game fairly with 
Guerra nor was it calculated to evoke a coldly neutral declaration 
of loyalty from the Texans. Fortunately the Turtle Bayou Resolutions 
had declared for Santa Anna and the Plan of Vera Cruz. Now those 
resolutions were reaffirmed, and Mexia found himself in accord with 
the movement. Had Guerra instead of Mexia led the expedition to 
Texas he would have received equally emphatic and less disingenuous 
assurance that the mass of the colonists stood firm for the govern¬ 
ment and condemned the attack on Anahuac. The Texans would 
simply have followed Austin’s time-honored policy of aloofness from 
party wars, standing circumspectly on their claim of adherence to 
the de facto government. 

A word of explanation is due concerning Austin’s attitude. He 
probably shaped Mexia’s letter to John Austin. He certainly wrote 
the reply to it. His actions were controlled by expediency alone. If 
it had been possible to avoid a declaration for Santa Anna, he would 
have avoided it, but the situation left him no choice. And yet, he 
believed in Santa Anna’s party, though not in Santa Anna, as much 
as it was possible for him to believe in any Mexican party. He had 
recently written Teran: 


168 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


I think that the party that has risen against the ministry is very badly 
named the party of Santa Anna. As I understand the situation, it ought to 
be called the democratic republican federal party. It seems to have made use 
of Santa Anna for lack of another leader, and this has given his name to the 
party, which seems to me to be a misfortune because it gives it a personal 
character when it ought to be named for principles. It appears that this party 
is very strong and that sooner or later it will embrace the great mass of the 
nation and triumph as it has done in the north and also in England and 
France, with a difference in form and men. I do not doubt that in the end 
it will triumph over all Europe and the Americas. It is the natural order. 
Water flows down hill; and man rises from a state of nature to civilization 
and the sciences, from slavery to freedom, advancing as by the steps of a 
ladder. These are laws of nature, at times retarded and slow in their opera¬ 
tion, but certain in their results. 

No finer confession of faith in democracy can be imagined. Nor 
can Austin’s sincerity be doubted. He had little confidence in Santa 
Anna, and did not believe that his party would follow him beyond the 
overthrow of the existing government. Perhaps the party itself would 
fail now because it lacked leadership, but the nation would learn by its 
failures and ultimately a real republic would develop. 

Mexia, finding the Texans pacified, loyal, and properly enthusiastic 
for his chief, sailed away on July 24 to more important duties in 
Mexico. A week later colonial Santanistas expelled Colonel Piedras 
and his garrison from Nacogdoches; Colonel Ruiz withdrew his com¬ 
pany from the upper Brazos, falling back to San Antonio; and Teran’s 
military dispositions for enforcing the Law of April 6, 1830, were 
at an end; Austin encountered some difficulty in persuading the political 
chief to declare for Santa Anna, but on August 30, 1832, that too 
was accomplished. Fortunately, for the moment, Santa Anna won. 

The Convention of 1832 .—Even before the issue of the civil war 
in Mexico was decided, the Texans determined to press their luck. 
On August 22, 1832, the Alcaldes of San Felipe sent out a call for 
a convention to meet on October 1. The purpose of the meeting as 
announced by the call was to proclaim the loyalty of the Texans to 
Mexico and to the cause of liberal reform represented by Santa 
Anna. Fifty-eight delegates met at the appointed time, all from the 
Anglo-American settlements. A Mexican delegation arrived from 
Goliad after the convention adjourned, but the more influential Mex¬ 
ican settlement at San Antonio refused to participate. The political 
chief declared that the meeting was contrary to the law, and was 
inexpedient, besides, because Santa Anna was not yet in power and 
could therefore not help Texas, while the declaration for Santa Anna 
would, of course, antagonize the Bustamante government. 

Besides acting upon a number of local matters, the convention peti¬ 
tioned for tariff exemption, repeal of the anti-immigration article of 
the Law of April 6, 1830, and separation from Coahuila and the estab¬ 
lishment of state government in Texas. Though the convention elected 
commissioners and took steps to provide funds for carrying the peti- 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 169 


tions to Mexico, the commissioners did not depart, and the matter 
dropped. The reasons for inaction can only be inferred, and are not 
wholly clear. In the first place, though Austin was president of the 
convention, there are indications that he doubted the propriety of the 
meeting, and particularly the wisdom of petitioning at the time for 
separation from Coahuila. Such a petition would certainly antago¬ 
nize Coahuila, and, in the light of the recent occurrences in Texas, 
would strengthen the suspicion that the Texans were headed toward 
secession. In the second place, there is some evidence of dissatis¬ 
faction with the convention among the settlers themselves. Some 
complained that insufficient time was allowed between the issuing of 
the call and the meeting and that the convention did not, therefore, 
wholly represent public opinion. Finally, it seemed obvious that 
favorable action on the petitions could not be expected in the face of 
the political chief’s disapproval of the meeting and the refusal of the 
Mexicans at San Antonio to participate in it. Austin was convinced 
that their cooperation was indispensable in order to allay suspicion 
that the Anglo-Americans were simply working for independence. 

Whatever the truth may be as to these matters of inference, Aus¬ 
tin started, soon after the convention adjourned, on a tour of the 
Mexican settlements. Both at Goliad and at San Antonio he succeeded 
in getting the local authorities and the leading citizens to adopt vigor¬ 
ous protests against the abuses of state and federal administration in 
Texas and to advocate substantially the same reforms that the con¬ 
vention had recently requested. It was in his mind to submit these 
documents independently to the state and federal governments. If 
they resulted in the desired reforms, well and good; if not, then the 
Mexican inhabitants might join the colonists in whatever further 
measures might seem necessary. 

The Convention of 1833 .—It was a good plan, but it required 
patience, and the situation got out of hand because Austin could not 
be in two places at once. While he was at San Antonio, the Central 
Committee, a standing committee of citizens elected by the convention 
in October, issued a call for another convention to meet on the first of 
April. The call was published in the Brazoria Advertiser and had 
gained too much publicity to be quashed or withdrawn when Austin 
learned about it. He felt that it compromised him with his friends 
at San Antonio, but nothing could be done about that. To put the 
best face possible on the approaching meeting, when it should come 
to the attention of the government, and perhaps with the hope of 
restraining the convention, he published the San Antonio protest, 
original and translation, in the Brazoria paper. It would show the 
government that the feelings of the ancient native inhabitants of Texas 
coincided with those of the colonists concerning the deficiencies of 
administration; and it might restrain the convention from repeating 
the former petition for the establishment of state government in 


170 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Texas. It is not to be understood that Austin did not want state 
government established for Texas. On the contrary, he believed that 
separation from Coahuila and establishment of state government were 
indispensable to the peace and welfare of Texas. He had written 
many long and able arguments on the subject to General Teran and 
to Lucas Alaman, while Alaman was minister of relations, but he 
did not believe that the time was now propitious for action by the 
convention. 

The impatient disposition of the convention, when it met, is prob¬ 
ably indicated by the election of William H. Wharton to preside in¬ 
stead of Austin. The members had had, for the moment, enough of 
slow-footed conservatism. The journal of the convention has not sur¬ 
vived. Its work as we know it, reconstructed from scattering 
documents, consisted in the adoption of petitions for state government 
in Texas, for the repeal of the anti-immigration article of the Law 
of April 6, 1830, for tariff exemption, and for improvement of the 
mail service. The impatience of the convention is further suggested 
by the fact that it was not content merely to petition for state govern¬ 
ment ; to avoid further delay, it drew up a constitution for the approval 
of Congress in case that body should be willing to grant the petition. 
This constitution, adapted from the Massachusetts constitution of 
1780, was drawn by a committee of which Sam Houston was chairman. 
We do not know the other members of the committee. 

To present and urge its various petitions upon the govern¬ 
ment, the convention elected Austin and Erasmo Seguin of San 
Antonio. The election of Seguin indicates the hope, of course, 
that the Mexicans, though unrepresented in the convention, might still 
be induced to support its petitions. The hope proved vain. They 
admitted the need of all the reforms asked by the convention—as 
they had already done in their protest of December, 1832—but 
thought neither the time nor the method propitious for obtaining them. 

In substance—though perhaps not in exactly the form that he 
desired—Austin won his contention that the convention should first 
petition for permission to organize as a state. Probably he would 
have preferred to hold back the proposed constitution until Congress 
approved the application for state organization, but its submission 
with the petition might do little harm. So, as he wrote his cousin, 
Henry Austin, he was well enough content. The letter is dated April 

19. i 8 33: 

I leave tomorrow for Mexico on the State government mission. I go with 
considerable—I may say strong—hopes of success. The course taken by the 
convention is the true one, I think. The memorial for admission as a state 
is respectful and dignified and based upon the law of the 7th May, 1824 
[uniting Coahuila and Texas], and I can see no just reason why any offence 
should be taken [to] it by the Government, nor why it should be refused. 
Texas cannot do any longer without a Government—things have been so dis- 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 171 


jointed ever since the military authority began to interfere with the civil, and 
with citizens, that nothing can set them to rights again but a state Govern¬ 
ment. I approve fully of the application for admission as a state, and I think 
it will succeed. The consequence of a failure will no doubt be war. 

Texas cannot, evidently, get along without a Govt, and if there should be 
no means of obtaining one with the approbation of Congress she must form 
one of herself in the best way she can. I have always been opposed to hasty 
and imprudent measures but if our application fails, I shall say we have 
exhausted the subject so far as it can be done by mild steps, and that a totally 
different course ought to be adopted, for we can then take a firm stand for 
rights that were respectfully petitioned for and unjustly detained. The sum 
and substance of the whole matter is that Texas must have a state Govern¬ 
ment. Nothing else will quiet this country or give any security to persons 
or property, and nothing else will be agreed to [by] me as the representative 
of the public wishes. ... I was opposed to putting our Govt, into operation 
until we first obtained the sanction of Congress. Such a step could not have 
been justified on solid grounds, but if after our application we get no remedy, 
I shall advise an immediate organization under the laws of 7th May, 1824, 
and a second application for admission as organised. That also failing we 
shall have to do the best we can. I say that I shall advise this—I mean in 
case the situation of the country continues to be as it now is; for at *his 
time we are in anarchy and there will be no middle course left between total 
ruin and an immediate organization—if our application should fail. 

Three days later Austin wrote his brother-in-law, James F. Perry: 

There is, I am told, some uneasiness that I shall [not] insist on the appro¬ 
bation of the constitution. I shall try and get the law of 6 April 1830 repealed 
and a declaration that the people of Texas may legally convene in convention 
to make a constitution. This much I expect to effect and no more. It is 
very evident that no act of mine can bind the people of Texas. What I do, 
if anything, shall be subject to their approbation of course—no one need have 
any fears that I will compromise Texas improperly. The interest of Texas 
is my interest. Unfortunately we have some personal parties amongst us— 
but this is an evil that will correct itself in time. I will write you all fre¬ 
quently—have confidence in me, untill you see what I do and then approve or 
punish as I merit—I start in five minutes. 

These quotations illuminate the convention’s procedure on the sub¬ 
ject of state organization. Evidently there was a strong disposition 
to organize and announce an accomplished fact, a radical measure 
which Austin certainly opposed. Possibly, in the debate, Austin 
raised the question of territorial organization under a suitable guar¬ 
antee of political rights. The radical element in control of the con¬ 
vention would hear nothing of territorial government, but agreed to 
modify the original program by petitioning for state organization and 
submitting at the same time—so as to avoid unnecessary delay—a 
draft of a constitution for Congress to approve. Having elected 
Austin to represent its wishes before the government because of his 
many well-recognized qualifications for the mission—and possibly be¬ 
cause he could be counted on to pay his own expenses—the conven¬ 
tion adjourned. Then doubts arose. Would Austin truly represent 


172 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the convention; would he urge its demands with sufficient firmness? 
Or would his habitual policy of temporizing betray him into an un¬ 
acceptable compromise ? 

This analysis of the situation is completely verified by a letter 
recently obtained by the University of Texas. It was written by John 
P. Coles, a friend of Austin’s, to Anthony Butler, minister of the 
United States in Mexico. Coles wrote: 

Col Austin goes to Mexico with an application from the people of Texas, for 
a state sepperate from Couhala, the application is made by a Convention of the 
people of Texas, and in reference to a decree of the Constituent Congress of 
the Mexican Federation under date of the 7th May 1824. If this application 
should fail an Effort will then be made as the Constitution provides, as we 
believe that we have a constitutional number of Inhabitants to Entitle us to 
that privaleage. Col Austin’s sincerity in this matter is much doubted by many 
people in Texas. I hope however that Austin will not forget himself and 
his Friends. He is Closely watched and his future prospects depend greatly 
upon his Conduct in this matter. 

If he succeeds he will do well for himself and If for the want of proper 
Exertion on his part the application should fail Col Austin will be a Ruined man 
in Texas. 

It is important to apprehend this tense situation, because it ex¬ 
plains much that follows. Austin went to Mexico in a desperate state 
of mind. The aggressive, discontented element had the upper hand 
in Texas and was rushing affairs to a crisis before, as he feared, the 
sparse population was strong enough to win a contest of arms. He 
felt himself worn to the limit of endurance by the perpetual struggle 
to prevent a premature outbreak which would bring the full strength 
of the government upon Texas. 

Austin in Mexico .—After various delays which need not be re¬ 
counted, Austin reached the capital about the middle of July. Though 
his efforts lacked neither industry nor vigor, August and September 
passed with nothing accomplished, and Gomez Farias, who was acting 
president in the absence of Santa Anna, conveyed the impression that 
nothing would be accomplished. For more than four months after his 
departure in April, Austin heard not a single word from Texas. Toward 
the end of September he received a letter from John P. Coles, of 
which we have no copy. Austin understood from it that the situa¬ 
tion in Texas was highly inflamed. Fearing an outbreak, Austin 
wrote the ayuntamiento of San Antonio, telling it that the govern¬ 
ment had granted none of the reforms which the Texans desired, and 
urging it to take the lead in the organization of a state government. 
If such a step were taken, and the step seemed inevitable, it would 
look much less questionable with the Mexican inhabitants of Texas 
in the lead. Suddenly the prospect changed for the better. Farias 
was mollified. Congress repealed the anti-immigration article of the 
Law of April 6, 1830. Santa Anna returned to the capital, and, while 
denying the petition for state organization, promised to exert influ- 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 173 


ence upon the legislature of Coahuila and Texas to obtain a judiciary 
law and other reforms for Texas. 

On December io Austin cheerfully set out for home. He was 
cheerful because he believed that the palpable results of his mission 
would allay discontent and postpone, if not prevent, the movement 
that seemed impending when the convention adjourned. Delay meant 
time gained for Texas to grow stronger by renewed immigration. 
On January 3, 1834, he was arrested at Saltillo for writing the letter 
urging the ayuntamiento of San Antonio to head the movement for 
state government. Presently we shall return to him in prison in 
Mexico. We must now cast an eye upon Texas. 

Texas during Austin's absence .—Austin closed one of the letters 
that he wrote his brother-in-law on the eve of departing for Mexico: 
“I have just heard of the colera at the mouth of the river and that 
there have been 5 deaths—dreadfull indeed—how I tremble for you 
all—pray be carefull and use all precautions.” The disease developed 
into an epidemic. Eighty persons died at Brazoria. Velasco, near 
the mouth of the Brazos, was almost depopulated. Other settlements 
suffered less, and some escaped entirely, but everywhere anxiety was 
intense and absorbing. Floods swept the Brazos and Colorado bottoms, 
in which half the colonists were settled. An unusually virulent season 
of malaria added its toll of suffering and death to that of cholera. 
Political excitement subsided and Austin’s letter to the ayuntamiento 
advising summary organization of a state government found even 
Brazoria, the hot-bed of discontent, ready to wait a year or two 
before renewing the demand for state government—provided the 
people were not in the meantime oppressed “by planting law-despising 
garrisons, custom houses, etc., etc., amongst us.” It was Austin’s 
misfortune that he was not informed of the change in the political 
temper. 

News of Austin’s arrest did not disturb the calm—more particu¬ 
larly because it reached Texas in the same mail with a flood of letters 
from Austin warning the people against any manifestation of public 
excitement. Austin’s friends were accustomed to following his advice 
in political matters, and they followed it now. Others were content 
enough with the general situation and were not disposed to exert 
themselves in Austin’s behalf. Forgetting the state of public opinion 
when he left Texas or failing to reflect that he had no means of 
knowing that sentiment had changed during his absence, they were 
inclined to think that he had brought misfortune upon himself and 
deserved what he got. Sam Houston, for example, wrote John A. 
Wharton, “I was provoked by his first letter, where he broke into 
prison ”—that is, by the letter advising the going on with the state 
organization. 

Therefore 1834 was a peaceful year and its annals here shall be 
brief. The repeal of the anti-immigration article of the Law of April 


174 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


6, 1830, was announced simultaneously with Austin’s arrest, and there 
was hope of tariff exemption later. During the following spring the 
legislature gave Texas many long desired reforms. It increased local 
autonomy by creating four new municipalities—those of Matagorda, 
San Augustine, Bastrop, and San Patricio—and by putting the depart¬ 
ments or political chieftaincies of the Brazos and Nacogdoches into 
operation. It gave Texas an additional representative in the legis¬ 
lature, which was to be composed now of three members from Texas 
and nine from Coahuila. It permitted the use of English in legal 
documents, and thrust into a new land law the declaration already 
noticed, that no person should be molested for religious opinions pro¬ 
vided he did not disturb public order. It repealed a law of three years’ 
standing that restricted retail trade to native-born citizens. Finally, 
it passed the judiciary act, giving Texas appellate circuit courts and 
trial by jury. These measures reinspired hope. Texas could wait 
yet awhile for state organization. 

The general feeling of optimism was increased by Colonel 
Almonte’s tour of inspection. Almonte came to Texas expecting to 
find the settlers on the verge of revolt, and with instructions from 
Gomez Farias to divert them with promises and false assurances 
until the government could be prepared to take hold of the situation 
with a firm hand. Contrary to his expectation, he found the settlers 
“well disposed and friendly.” They, too, from being at first inclined 
to regard Almonte as a spy, became convinced that he was honestly 
seeking information upon which the government might base intelli¬ 
gent reform. What oral reports of his inspection Almonte may have 
made, after his return to Mexico, we do not know; but in all his 
available writings he recognized and condemned most of the abuses 
of which the colonists had complained, and seems to have believed 
that the removal of these and the establishment of political order in 
Mexico were the conditions most essential to the contentment and 
loyalty of the colonists. 

During the summer of 1834 a quarrel between Saltillo in the south 
of Coahuila and Monclova in the north over the location of the 
capital resulted in confusion and violence, and ultimately in the estab¬ 
lishment of an illegal government in both places. Using this situation 
as a pretext, the Mexican political chief of the department of Bexar, 
or San Antonio, and the newly appointed political chief of the Anglo- 
American department of the Brazos fostered a call for a convention to 
meet in November to establish yet a third illegal government at San 
Antonio; but the call fell flat, and the year ended with peace in the 
American settlements unbroken. 

Political disorders .—The relative tranquillity of 1834 was, how¬ 
ever, merely the proverbial lull before the storm. Political develop¬ 
ments in Mexico were driving rapidly toward a crisis. Santa Anna, 
who had risen to the presidency as the leader of the Liberal Repub- 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 175 


lican party, had flirted throughout the year with the defeated Cen¬ 
tralist party, which was reputed to be the party of the military and 
ecclesiastical aristocracy. By the end of the year he had decided to 
desert the Liberals and go over definitely to the Centralists. There¬ 
after he was practically dictator. On May 2, 1835, the Congress 
promulgated the remarkable declaration that it possessed “extra¬ 
constitutional powers” to make such changes in the federal constitu¬ 
tion of 1824 as it thought to be for the good of the nation, without 
subjecting itself to the tedious procedure prescribed by the constitu¬ 
tion for amendments. Hoping to forestall and disarm opposition, 
Congress had passed a law a month before reducing the state militia 
to the proportion of one man for each five hundred inhabitants. The 
final act of centralization was a law passed on October 3, 1835, dis- 
solving the federal system and placing the state governments in the 
hands of executives and councils appointed by the president. This 
decree, however, did not affect the Texans. The first gun of the 
Texas revolution was fired before its passage. Though strong oppo¬ 
sition to the reactionary program appeared in a number of states, it 
was everywhere suppressed—sometimes, as in Zacatecas, with shock¬ 
ing severity. 

Austin was observing these developments in the federal govern¬ 
ment at close range, but confessed his inability to interpret them. 
From the middle of February until December 25, 1834, he was in 
prison in the City of Mexico, awaiting trial on general charges of 
disaffection over which no court was willing to accept jurisdiction. 
He was released on bond on Christmas day, and wrote Samuel M. 
Williams on December 31 that he had been too long out of the world 
to know much about politics, but, he continued, “those who have had 
better opportunities seem to know as little—in short, nobody seems to 
understand what is going on. . . . Great political difficulties are feared 
by many, while others seem to rely on a peace of exhaustion, the 
want of means to revolutionize.” He had not seen Santa Anna and 
had no report to make of him but declared that little could be said 
of “his political course in general.” On March 10, 1835, Austin wrote 
his brother-in-law: “The political character of this country seems to 
partake of its geological features—all is volcanic. . . . There is a 
fuss at Vera Cruz; the garrison of the Castle mutinied, tied their 
officers, and are bombarding the city. All the rest of the country 
is quiet. To say how long it will remain so would be the same as 
to say when Vesuvius will or will not explode.” On April 4 he wrote: 
“There is no danger of a change in the system of government; The fed¬ 
eration is in no danger.” On April 15, however, he wrote: “There 
will be some change, but not a radical one—This is my opinion.” 
Finally, on the eve of his departure from Mexico, July 13, 1835, 
he wrote: “There seems to be no doubt that the system of government 
will be changed from federal to central, though it probably will be 


176 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

some months before the new constitution can be framed and 
published.” 

There is much evidence that Austin’s stubborn hope for the devel¬ 
opment of peaceful, stable government in Mexico was completely dis¬ 
illusioned during the two and a half years of his absence from Texas. 
As early as October, 1833, he wrote his brother-in-law: “I am tired 
of this government. They are always in revolution and I believe 
always will be. I have had much more respect for them than they 
deserve.” His own experiences emphasized his disillusionment. As 
was said a moment ago, all 1834 passed while he was being shunted 
from prison to prison with one court after another disclaiming juris¬ 
diction to try his case. When he was released on bond he thought 
that the rest of his trial could not consume more than a month—his 
friends thought much less. On January 21 acquittal was still two or 
three weeks in the future. By February 6 further thought of com¬ 
pleting the trial was abandoned; he was awaiting publication of a 
general amnesty law, and hoped to leave for Monclova and a meeting 
with Williams in ten or fifteen days. A week later he might be released 
by the first of March. By March 10 he no longer ventured a guess. 
The amnesty law had finally gone to the president for approval, but 
it was rumored that he would return it to Congress for alterations. 
“This,” said Austin, “is a measure in which many thousands are 
deeply interested and one that the government and three-fourths or 
more of both houses and all the influential men are anxious should 
pass, and yet it has to travel the usual snail’s pace of public matters. 
This example ought, of itself, to be proof to some of those who are 
so ready to blame me at home of the delay and difficulty of effect¬ 
ing anything here.” On April 4 he hoped to be free by the end of 
the month, but by the 15th there had been no change, and he made 
no calculations. The law was finally approved and published on 
May 3, and he hoped to have his bond cancelled in time to start home¬ 
ward with Don Victor Blanco on the 26th. But the matter was not 
so simple. A ruling must first be obtained that Austin’s offense 
was comprehended in the amnesty law. This was settled on June 22, 
and on July 11 his passport was issued and he left within a week for 
Vera Cruz to return to Texas by New Orleans. 

The crisis in Texas .—We must precede Austin to Texas and notice 
the disturbing developments there since the coming of the new year, 
1835. The state government was again in dire confusion through the 
renewal of the quarrel between Saltillo and Monclova over the loca¬ 
tion of the capital. Taking advantage of the fact that the govern¬ 
ment at Monclova was hostile to Santa Anna, Saltillo declared for 
the dictator, and thereby gained the decisive support of General Cos, 
commandant general of the Eastern Interior Provinces. With the 
hope, or with the pretext, of obtaining the necessary resources to 
defend the legitimate state government against attack from Saltillo, 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 177 


the legislature of 1835 had sold vast quantities of land in Texas to a 
few speculators. Cos seized upon the speculations; declared the land 
sales a violation of the federal colonization law—though the statement 
was technically untrue; and sent a military force against Monclova 
to dissolve the government. The legislature hastily adjourned, but 
Cos’s troops deposed and arrested the governor. The Texans were 
thoroughly disgusted by the land speculations and refused to lift a 
hand in defense of the state government, but events were neverthe¬ 
less driving them toward a crisis. 

It was inevitable that any administration strong enough to extri¬ 
cate itself from difficulties nearer home must turn its attention sooner 
or later to Texas. The custom houses and their accompanying guards 
must be revived. This was not merely to collect the duty on imports 
consumed by the colonists. Almonte reported an enormous smuggling 
trade to the interior that should have paid duty at Matamoros and 
gone to maintain the military chest of the Eastern Provinces. He 
probably did not exaggerate. Official correspondence from San 
Antonio contains many complaints of the practice, which was casually 
admitted by the Texans. The first step toward a firmer regime in 
Texas was the appointment of General Cos to be commandant of the 
Eastern Provinces. He, in turn, made Colonel Ugartechea command¬ 
ant of Texas. Ugartechea was an honorable, sensible, and tactful 
officer, but one not likely to minimize the importance of any obligation 
due the national government. Then, in January, 1835, Captain 
Antonio Tenorio with a detachment of soldiers and a collector arrived 
at Anahuac to reopen the custom house. A deputy collector was 
stationed at Brazoria; and immediately, to all outward appearance, 
the hand of time moved back three years, with Tenorio and Gonzales, 
the collector, now playing the role of Bradburn and Fisher, and 
Andrew Briscoe and Travis that of Patrick Jack and John Austin. 

Briscoe was a merchant at Anahuac. He particularly resented the 
enforcement of the tariff there because he believed that it was not 
being enforced in other Texan ports. Irritation led to practical jokes 
on the guards, and these, in turn, to retaliation on the jokers. In the 
end Briscoe and a friend were arrested and lodged in the guard 
house. 

News of the arrests reached San Felipe about the time that a 
military courier arrived in the village with mail. He delivered a letter 
from General Cos to James B. Miller, the political chief, telling him 
of the arrest of the governor and the suspension of civil government 
at Monclova. It was court week, and the town was crowded. Despite 
the fact that the people had recently refused to obey the governor’s 
call for militia and had expressed their keen disgust at the wasteful 
land legislation, there was now great excitement. A group quickly 
gathered around the courier and seized other letters that he was bear¬ 
ing to Tenorio. Among these was a letter from Cos assuring Tenorio 


178 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


that heavy reinforcements would sail shortly to his relief and another 
from Ugartechea saying that the troops that had crushed Zacatecas 
were then at Saltillo on the way to Texas. The details of what fol¬ 
lowed are not entirely clear. Apparently a meeting collected and 
elected the political chief to preside. According to Travis it adopted 
a resolution “‘that, in connection with the general defense of the 
country against military sway, the troops of Anahuac should be dis¬ 
armed and ordered to leave Texas.” 

The next day another meeting, presided over by R. M. William¬ 
son, adopted resolutions reviewing Santa Anna’s violations of the 
federal and state constitutions and declaring their intention to main¬ 
tain these instruments in their original republican character. An 
address by Williamson on the Fourth of July following gives the 
additional information that the meeting resolved to capture San 
Antonio, take possession of the military equipment collected there, 
and install the vice-governor, Ramon Musquiz, at the head of a pro¬ 
visional government pending the release of Governor Viesca. The 
meeting was attended, said Williamson by some of the oldest citizens 
of Texas, men in no way concerned with the speculations; “upon 
investigation [they] declared the country in danger and that no time 
should be lost in preparing for war.” 

Travis, in the meantime, was enlisting volunteers to expel Tenorio 
from Anahuac, an enterprise that certain friends of his at that place 
had previously begged him to undertake. On June 29, with twenty- 
five men and a small cannon, he appeared before the garrison and 
demanded its surrender. The next day Tenorio gave up his arms and 
agreed to lead his men from Texas. 

Travis returned to San Felipe to find himself and the meeting 
of the 22d the target of severe criticism. People resented the apparent 
effort to “stampede” them into precipitate action. A large meeting 
at Columbia, on June 28, condemned the “acts and conduct of any 
set of individuals (less than a majority) calculated to involve the 
citizens of Texas in a conflict with the federal government of Mexico.” 
It declared that separation from Mexico was neither the wish nor 
the interest of the people. At the same time it exhorted the people 
to adhere strictly to the constitution and laws, and urged the political 
chief to take steps to defend the frontier from Indian depredations. 
Militia organized to fight Indians would be equally effective against 
Mexicans, and, since Santa Anna was then remaking the constitu¬ 
tion, adherence to the original instrument would be equivalent to 
rebellion; but, despite this apparent ambiguity, there is strong evidence 
of the pacific intent of the meeting. Other communities followed 
Columbia’s lead, declaring their loyalty and their desire to remain at 
peace. Some specifically condemned the attack on Anahuac. Miller 
apologized for the meeting of the 21st. Travis declared that he had 
acted with the most patriotic motive, which no doubt he had, and 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 179 


asked the public to suspend judgment until he could publish an 
explanation. By the middle of July observers of all shades of opinion 
agreed that the people wanted peace and would maintain it unless 
some extraordinary provocation occurred. 

Provocation did not tarry. Cos issued a requisition for the arrest 
of Travis, Williamson, and others who had been conspicuous in the 
recent agitations and ordered Ugartechea to enforce it. He declined 
to receive a peace commission until the men were delivered. At the 
same time it became certain that Cos, with large reinforcements, 
intended to assume command in person at San Antonio. Why was 
he coming if not, as the alarmists argued, to establish military rule? 

In any event, the colonists could no longer afford to drift. A 
deliberate policy was desirable, if not essential. Therefore, on August 
20 a committee of fifteen, appointed by a meeting at Columbia on the 
15th, issued an urgent call for a convention, or consultation. Only 
by such means, said the committee, could the people be united, either 
for peace or war. Cursing the land speculators and the war party 
would avail nothing. The situation was menacing and must be faced. 
The plan, in brief, was for each precinct to elect five delegates— 
“selected for their wisdom and honesty and their deep interest in the 
welfare of their country”—to meet on October 15 at Washington on 
the Brazos. There was wisdom in the proposal, but it came from the 
war party and would probably have failed had Austin not arrived 
opportunely and approved it without hesitation or qualification. 

Austin takes charge .—Austin arrived at Velasco on September 
1, and a wave of relief swept quickly over the country. There was 
great anxiety concerning the propriety of another convention. Past 
conventions had not been successful either in obtaining reforms or 
in uniting the people. Were the Columbia radicals not trying to 
precipitate a crisis that could still be avoided? San Felipe was now 
controlled by the peace party, and opposed the meeting. As the cap¬ 
ital of the department of the Brazos, championing the policy that 
Austin had always advocated, its attitude would go far toward defeat¬ 
ing the convention. Though popular meetings at Nacogdoches and San 
Augustine had endorsed the meeting, the ayuntamiento of Nacog¬ 
doches forbade the election of delegates. Uncertainty ended, or 
ceased to trouble, with Autsin’s return. A committee from Brazoria 
invited him to a public dinner, where the people could “express their 
approval of his public services and their respect for his private vir¬ 
tues.” A similar committee from San Felipe inquired when they 
might escort him into the town where all were “prepared to receive 
him with open arms and acclamations of joy.” 

The Brazoria dinner was set for September 8, and the day must 
have been awaited with keen suspense, for it was well understood that 
Austin would deliver a “keynote” speech, charting the course that 
must be immediately followed. If he approved the consultation, elec- 


180 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


tions would go forward with no further doubts; if he opposed, the 
plan would certainly fail, and would probably be abandoned. He had 
peace or war in his hands, and the people would unquestioningly 
accept what he gave. He spoke unequivocally for the consultation. 
Whether the people were to accept or reject the change from republi¬ 
can to centralized government could only be determined by such a 
meeting. Santa Anna had repeatedly assured him, he said, that he 
wished to give the Texans “a special organization suited to their 
education, habits, and situation”; but only by such a meeting could 
Santa Anna be informed of the sort of organization that would suit 
their “education, habits, and situation.” He had uniformly warned 
Santa Anna, he said, that “the inevitable consequence of sending an 
armed force to this country would be war”; yet troops were coming 
in large numbers, and a Mexican war vessel had already been ravag¬ 
ing the coast. The people were not responsible for this condition, 
but they must decide what to do about it, and for that a convention 
was necessary. It was plain enough to Austin that war was all but 
inevitable and that, if disaster was to be avoided, the people must 
be united. 

Austin threw himself now with the utmost energy into the task 
of securing a fully representative convention. A public meeting at 
San Felipe made him a member of the local committee of corre¬ 
spondence on September 12; and thereafter, by common consent, the 
direction of events passed definitely to him. 

The first, gun of the Revolution .—On September 21, Austin sent 
out information that General Cos had landed at Copano with a large 
force and that a band of Texans was gathering to prevent his uniting 
with Ugartechea at San Antonio. Ugartechea’s inopportune demand 
for a cannon at Gonzales and the refusal of the inhabitants to deliver 
it diverted attention from Cos and enabled him to slip into San Antonio 
unopposed. The situation at Gonzales quickly developed into a clash 
and on October 2, 1835, the first shot was fired in the Texas Revo¬ 
lution. 

The causes of the Texas Revolution .—In the end, it was the devel¬ 
opment of national politics, I think, which precipitated the Texas 
revolution. Not to mention local and state insurrections and isolated 
“plans” and pronunciamentoes touching national affairs, there were 
four major revolutions during the six years from 1829 to 1835. 
First, the grim old warrior, Vicente Guerrero, overthrew the mild 
and liberal Pedraza and ruled for nine months, most of the time in¬ 
vested by Congress with the military power of a dictator, to enable 
him to repel the Spanish invasion of 1829. Second, General Busta¬ 
mante succeeded Guerrero by the sword and gave his power a fictitious 
legality by the sanction of Congress. Third, the Republican Santa 
Anna overthrew Bustamante and restored the accommodating Pedraza 
to the presidency—all with the approval of Congress—in order to gain 


DEVELOPMENT OF THE TEXAS REVOLUTION 181 


time for his own formal election as the champion of liberalism and 
democracy. Finally, Santa Anna, the Liberal, yielded to Santa Anna, 
the reactionary Centralist, and a centralized dictatorship took the 
place of the so-called federal republic—again with the fictitious Con¬ 
gressional. sanction. The successive eruptions gave no indication of 
a tendency toward national political stability; quite the contrary—a 
fact which might be expected to have caused, and which did cause, 
uneasy reflections in Texas. 

The really ominous fact, however, was that each successive change 
seemed to bring Texas more completely within the blighting sphere 
of the federal government’s attention. Guerrero issued the emanci¬ 
pation decree of 1829; Bustamante approved the fateful Law of April 
6, 1830, which, had it been enforced with its original design, would 
undoubtedly have paralyzed the development of Texas for many years; 
Santa Anna’s Liberal revolt, by a fortuitous chain of circumstances, 
caused the abandonment of Austin’s policy of aloofness and brought 
the Texans squarely into the national party convulsions that Austin 
had always tried to avoid; finally, the victory of Centralism threat¬ 
ened, as the Texans would have expressed it, to bring the country 
under the heel of military despotism. 

There are many indications, only three of which can be men¬ 
tioned now, that Santa Anna’s about-face from Liberalism to Central¬ 
ism was the last unbearable straw upon the proverbial camel’s back. 

In the first place, I think it determined Austin’s attitude, and 
Austin’s attitude was decisive. He could have disorganized the resist¬ 
ance of the colonists in the fall of 1835; instead, he organized and 
united their resistance. 

In the second place, R. M. Williamson’s Fourth of July address, 
explaining the circumstances that led to Travis’s attack on Anahuac, 
was directed entirely toward the end of convincing the Texans that 
they were in dire danger from Santa Anna’s destruction of the federal 
system. Williamson was not a radical malcontent chronically bent 
upon stirring up agitation, but was a man of independent mind and 
generally of sound judgment. A brief quotation will illustrate the 
tone and content of his very long speech: “All the states have suc¬ 
cumbed to the power of the military,” he said, “and, as Texas is the 
only spot unconquered, Santa Anna is marching his troops here to 
compel a submission to the new government. And the people have 
to determine whether they also will yield to the power of the dic¬ 
tator; give up their arms; suffer their country to be garrisoned with 
strong military posts; and live under the rule and sway of the military. 
They must do this or they must prepare for war; they must submit 
to the military government or they must defend their province and 
their rights with the sword and the bayonet; and they must do this 
without delay, for the enemy is advancing on our country.” 

The third bit of evidence to be mentioned here, indicating the 


182 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


importance which the Texans attached to the centralization of the 
government, is furnished by a set of resolutions drawn by David G. 
Burnet on August 8, 1835, and adopted by a public meeting on the 
San Jacinto River. Burnet was a man of judicious temperament, and 
wrote as a conservative and a pacifist. Assuming it to be true that 
the federal system was destroyed, he saw no reason, he said, why 
Texas should not be happy under another form of government. Names 
were the mere signification of things, he declared, and the people were 
not “so obstinately prejudiced in favor of the term, ‘federal republic* 
as ... to reject another government purely because it has assumed 
a different external sign or denomination.’* 

Always in the background was the fatal fact that the Mexicans 
distrusted and feared the Anglo-American settlers while the Texans 
distrusted and half despised the Mexicans. Mutual annoyances were 
magnified and disturbed by the atmosphere of suspicion and mis¬ 
understanding. At bottom, the Texas revolution was the product 
of the racial and political inheritances of the two peoples. 


CHAPTER XVII 


THE LAW OF APRIL 6, 1830 

By Stephen F. Austin and William H. Wharton 

[The Law of April 6, 1830, was a general law, designed to stop the settle¬ 
ment of colonists from the United States in Texas and to promote the settle¬ 
ment of Mexicans and Europeans in Texas. Articles ten and eleven, which 
were the most objectionable parts of the law to the Texans, were as follows: 

10. No change shall be made with respect to the colonies already estab¬ 
lished, nor with respect to the slaves which they contain—but the general gov¬ 
ernment and that of each particular state, shall exact, under the strictest re¬ 
sponsibilities, the observance of the colonization laws and the prevention of 
further introduction of slaves. 

11. In exercise of the right reserved to the general congress by the 7th 
article of the law of 18th August, 1824, the citizens of foreign countries lying 
adjacent to the Mexican territory are prohibited from settling as colonists in 
the states or territories of the republic adjoining such countries. Those con¬ 
tracts of colonization, the terms of which are opposed to the present article, 
and which are not yet complied with, shall consequently be suspended. 

For further discussion of the law read: Barker, The Life of Stephen F. 
Austin, Chapter X; Howren, “Causes and Origin of the Law of April 6, 1830,” 
in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XVI, 378-422; Barker (editor), 
The Austin Papers, II, 377-428. 

The first of the two documents which follow was written by Stephen F. 
Austin and is published in The Austin Papers, II, 386-391. The second docu¬ 
ment is the report of a committee of the Convention of 1832, and is pub¬ 
lished conveniently in Gammel, Laws of Texas, I, 486-490. William H. Whar¬ 
ton was chairman of the committee which prepared the report and the docu¬ 
ment is probably in the main the work of Wharton.] 

I. Argument Against the Law of April 6 , 1830 1 
By Stephen F. Austin 1 

At the period of Mexican independence in 1821 , Texas was unin¬ 
habited by a civilized population, except the towns of Bexar and 
Goliad. It was infested by numerous bands of hostile Indians who 
sallied forth at pleasure to rob and desolate the settlements on the 
Rio Bravo, extending their depredations into the mountains to the 

1 The date of this document can not be determined positively. Austin most 
probably wrote it during the summer of 1833 while in Mexico petitioning for 
the repeal of the immigration articles of the Law of April 6, 1830. 

183 


184 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

neighborhood of Monclova and Monterey, and along the coast of 
Tamaulipas. 

The system of frontier defence used by the Spanish government 
of establishing military posts or presidios, was never an effectual bar¬ 
rier, for when those posts were in their best state of armament, the 
most that was done was to protect the immediate vicinity without 
being able to cover the whole country, or prevent the Indians from 
harassing the frontier settlements, and committing robberies on the 
public roads. 

The natural consequence was, that the civilized settlements were 
limited to the garrisoned towns. A few scanty villages were thus 
sustained like isolated specks in the midst of a wilderness at an enor¬ 
mous expense to the government and a great waste of men and money. 
A country thus situated could evidently yield no revenue in return 
for the millions expended in its defence; it could not advance much 
in population or improvement, nor add anything to the physical 
force of the nation, but on the contrary, weakened it. 

It may therefore be said with truth, that under the old system of 
presidial defence, the whole of that part of the Mexican territory 
situated north and east of a line from near Soto la Marina on the 
Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of California was an expense and a dead 
weight to the government. 

The experience of years had already convinced the Spanish author¬ 
ities of the internal provinces, of the absolute inefficacy of the old 
system of frontier defence, and that the only effectual and perma¬ 
nent barrier was population, the settlement of the frontier by a hardy 
and enterprising race of people before whom the savages would retire, 
or become submissive. 

The result of this new opinion was a total change of the ruinous 
restrictive system which had for centuries locked up the whole of 
the Spanish possessions from the rest of the world. The first step 
that was taken towards the new system of frontier defence was the 
grant to Moses Austin on the 17 January, 1821, to settle a colony 
of North Americans in the wilderness of Texas. 

During that year, 1821, the independence was achieved, and the 
lights of liberal and republican principles shed their benign influ¬ 
ence over the whole country. One of the first acts of the new gov¬ 
ernment was to open the door to the emigration of foreigners, the 
colonization laws were enacted, and emigrants were expressly and 
earnestly invited to enter. Under the faith and operation of those 
laws the settlement of Texas was commenced, and its wilderness was 
rapidly changing its uninhabited state and wild aspect, and yielding 
to the progress of civilized population, led on by enterprise and per¬ 
severance. 

The emigrants to Texas, it is well known, have never received 
any succors from the government—no garrisons were sent to pro- 


THE LAW OF APRIL 6, 1830 


185 


tect them during their infancy from the hostile Indians who then filled 
every part of the country. They have never cost the government one 
cent—all they have ever received was permission to settle in the 
country, and a title for the lands they redeemed from the wilderness, 
lands that were then valueless to Mexico or to civilized man. Left 
to their own resources and daring enterprise, they have conquered 
a wilderness, and made known to Mexico and to the world the true 
value, and developed the resources, of a large portion of the Mexican 
territory which was before hid in obscurity. They have also greatly 
contributed to the new system of frontier defence by means of popu¬ 
lation and fully tested its efficacy, for the savages have retired before 
them, as they will continue to do, if the same system is pursued, until 
they are reduced to full subjection or settled in villages as agri¬ 
culturists. 

It is certainly a natural and very rational inquiry: What induce¬ 
ments, what incentives, what hopes, could have operated so power¬ 
fully upon the minds of the emigrants to Texas, as to have given 
them fortitude to brave the dangers of savage foes, to despise the 
hardships and privations of the wilderness, to support them through 
trials and privations at which the stoutest hearts shrink, the cries 
of their little children even for bread, the well-founded fears and 
despondency of their wives, surrounded as they were the first years 
of the settlement, by Indians, famine, and sickness and by the dark 
gloom of moments when even hope almost recoiled from the future? 
What impulse of freedom and deeply imbedded hope bore them up 
and carried them through such difficulties? Was it the bare expecta¬ 
tion of getting a piece of land in a wild wilderness and there living 
on the mere products of their manual labor, and degenerating into the 
habits of wild Indians? No—common sense, and the characters and 
former habits of those settlers, unite in saying— NO. But on the 
contrary the great and nerving hope that bore them onward, was to 
redeem this country from the wilderness, and convert it into the abode 
of civilization, of abundance and happiness, and by that means to 
repay themselves, their wives and children for the hardships and suf¬ 
ferings of their early settlement, and also to repay the government 
more than thousand fold for the privilige of settling in Texas, and 
of making wild lands valuable, that before were valueless. 

On what grounds was such a hope as this founded? It was 
founded on the colonization laws, on the general, liberal and broad 
invitation given in those laws to the whole world to come and settle 
in Texas, on the faith of the government that such an invitation would 
not be thus given merely to draw a few unsuspicious emigrants to 
this wilderness and then to close the door and shut them out forever 
from their friends and relations, and in fact from the balance of the 
civilized world, when years of struggling through difficulties had just 
begun to realize their hopes. Could the first emigrants have supposed 


186 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


that they would have been deprived of the privilege of settling by 
their sides a son or daughter, an aged father or widowed mother, a 
brother or sister, an old and affectionate friend or neighbor of other 
days and of other countries, because they did not emigrate on this 
or on that particular day ? Could they have supposed that the general 
invitations of the colonization laws were mere time serving and 
temporary expedients which were to be changed without any apparent 
reason and without any violation of duty on the part of the first 
emigrants; is it reasonable to suppose that they would have labored 
as they have done, suffered what they have suffered, to bring forward 
this country, and give value character, and credit to it? No—they 
built their hopes on the permanency of the colonizing system, on the 
faith of the government pledged in their colonization laws, on the 
broad basis of philanthropy and republican freedom which they sup¬ 
posed had been adopted as the foundation on which the social insti¬ 
tutions of Mexico were erected. Those hopes were certainly not 
entertained without a sufficient cause, and neither are they now 
destroyed notwithstanding the restrictions which are imposed by the 
Law of 6 April, 1830, which totally interdicts the emigration of North 
Americans, for it is confidently believed that those restrictions grew 
out of peculiar circumstances, party excitements and hasty jealousies 
which no longer exist. 

It seems to have been received as a correct opinion that the inhab¬ 
itants of Texas wished to separate from Mexico and unite with the 
United States of the North. It seems that the virulence of party feel¬ 
ings even went so far as to suspect that a friendly and republican 
government whose territory is already too great for its population, 
wished to seize upon Texas. Such opinions and suspicions are evi¬ 
dently at variance with the conduct and avowed wishes of those 
emigrants, and with the true and substantial interests of Texas, on 
the one hand; and with the good faith and established policy and 
principles of the government of the United States on the other. Texas 
could gain nothing by a separation from Mexico, except a removal 
of the ruinous restrictions that now impede its progress in population 
and wealth, and if those restrictions were taken off, there is not a 
rational man in the country who would not oppose a separation. The 
true interests of Texas are to become a State of the Mexican confed¬ 
eration, and this is the desire of its inhabitants. By the law of 7 of 
May, 1824, forming the State of Coahuila and Texas, the latter was 
only provisionally annexed to the former, until it possessed the neces¬ 
sary elements to form a state of itself and this very law was another 
inducement to the emigrants to persevere, for it held out the induce¬ 
ment, amounting even to certainty, that Texas would be a State so 
soon as its population and resources were sufficient. Moral obliga¬ 
tion, and interests are the two great cords that bind communities, 
states and nations together. In no instance can the principle of inter- 


THE LAW OF APRIL 6, 1830 


187 


est be stronger than in the present one, supposing the restriction 
against emigrants to be taken off. 

Texas must be an agricultural country, and the most of its agri¬ 
cultural productions will find a much better market in the Mexican 
ports than in those of any part of the world. The interior trade by 
land will also be very important. At this time, this trade is prin¬ 
cipally carried on through Missouri to New Mexico and Chihuahua, 
but the geographical situation of the country and the practicability 
of roads from the harbors of Texas, evidently indicate that the natural 
channel of that trade is from those ports, in preference to the cir¬ 
cuitous route by Missouri through a foreign country, subjecting 
merchandise to a double duty which they would be exempt from if 
taken from the ports of this nation. 

The manufactures of Texas, abounding as this country does in 
facilities for their establishment, would evidently lose by a separation 
from Mexico. In fact there is not one interest in Texas that would 
not be injured by a separation, not one that would not be materially 
benefited by the erection of this country into a state of Mexico. 

This being the case, why drive the people of Texas to desperation 
by a system of restriction, that is at variance with the inducements 
and well founded hopes first held out to the emigrants, and with 
the true interests of the country? The nth article of the Law of 
6 April, 1830, totally prohibits the immigration of North Americans, 
and suspends contracts previously entered into by the government, 
thereby depriving the present settlers of the consolation of settling 
their relatives and friends alongside of them. It also cuts off all 
hope of future advancements for years to come and condenms this 
country to a wilderness. The hope of bringing out emigrants from 
Europe is a faint and distant one, and will require many years and a 
vast amount of capital to accomplish it. And, besides, what security 
or guarantee have they, in coming here, that they will not also be 
deprived of the privilege of bringing out their relations and friends 
after they have suffered years of hardships in preparing a home 
for them, as the settlers from the United States have been by the 
Law of April 6, 1830? 

Under this view of the subject, it certainly appears evident that 
that part of the Law of 6 April, 1830, prohibiting the immigration of 
North Americans is unjust and at variance with the faith and pledges 
of the government and with the true and substantial interests of 
Texas. That law will not, and cannot prevent the introduction of 
hundreds and thousands into Texas, who, if they do not receive the 
sanction of the government to remain and acquire real estate, will, 
as a matter of course, become restive and perhaps, jeopardize the 
public tranquillity. But, on the other hand, by opening the door for 
admission of honest and honorable men of high character and prop¬ 
erty, the moral influence of such men will correct and direct public 


188 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


opinion, and make the moral tie, as well as that of interest, which 
does and ought to bind Texas to Mexico indissolubly. 

II. Petition for the Repeal of the Law of April 6, 1830 
By William H. Wharton 

To the Federal Congress of Mexico: 

Your memorialists, representatives of all the Anglo-Americans in 
Texas, in general Convention met, taking advantage of that sacred 
and republican privilege of making known their wants and grievances 
which is guaranteed to them by the Constitution of their adopted 
country, respectfully represent, that they have viewed, and still view, 
with sentiments of the deepest regret and mortification, the passage 
and the present existence of the nth Article of the law of the 6th 
of April, 1830. This law is obnoxious to your memorialists for 
many reasons. Independent of its withering influence on all the 
hopes of Texas, it implies a suspicion of our fidelity to the Mexican 
Constitution. Such suspicion we humbly conceive to be utterly un¬ 
warranted; and we will endeavor to prove it so, by taking a review 
of our conduct from the passage of the first colonization law up to 
the present period. 

In the year 1823, the Congress of the Mexican Nation invited the 
citizens of the United States of the North to becpme inhabitants of 
Texas, giving to each family one sitio of land for so doing. This 
donation of land sounds largely at a distance. Considering, however, 
the difficulties with which the taking possession of it was environed, it 
will not be thought so magnificent a bounty, nor so entire a gratuity. Had 
these lands been previously pioneered by the enterprise of the govern¬ 
ment and freed from the insecurities which beset a wilderness trod 
only by savages; had they been in the heart of an inhabited region, 
and accessible to the comforts and necessaries of life; had the govern¬ 
ment been deriving an actual revenue from them; could it have real¬ 
ized a capital from the sale of them, then we admit that the donation 
would have been unexampled in the history of national liberality. 
But how different from all this, was the real state of the case? The 
lands in question, were situated in a wilderness of which the govern¬ 
ment had never taken possession. They were not sufficiently explored 
to obtain that knowledge of their character and situation which would 
be necessary to a sale of them. They were in the occupancy of sav¬ 
ages. They were shut out from all commercial intercourse with the 
world, and inaccessible to the commonest comforts of life; nor were 
they brought into possession and cultivation without much toil and 
privation and patience and enterprise and loss of lives from Indian 
hostilities and other causes. Under the smiles of a beneficent Heaven, 


THE LAW OF APRIL 6, 1830 


189 


however, the untiring perseverance of the immigrants, in a great de¬ 
gree, triumphed over all natural obstacles; it reduced the forest into 
cultivation, made the desert smile, established commercial intercourse 
with the rest of the world, and expelled the savages, by whom the 
country was infested. 

From this, it must appear that the lands of Texas, although nomi¬ 
nally given, were in fact really and dearly bought. It may here be 
premised that a gift of lands by a nation to foreigners, on condition 
of their becoming citizens, is immensely different from a gift, or sale, 
from one individual to another. In the case of individuals, the donor, 
or seller, loses all further claims upon the lands parted with. But in 
this case, the government only gave wild lands that they might be 
redeemed from a state of nature, that the obstacles to a first settle¬ 
ment might be overcome, and that they might be placed in a situation 
to augment the physical strength, and the power, and the revenue of 
the nation. Is it not obvious, that Mexico now holds the same juris¬ 
diction over the colonized lands of Texas that all nations hold over 
nineteen-twentieths of their territory? For the first six or seven 
years after the commencement of our settlements in Texas, we grate¬ 
fully admit, that our enterprise was animated, and our hardships al¬ 
leviated, by the kindness and liberality of the Mexican government. 
We insist, however, that this beneficent disposition of the govern¬ 
ment was followed by gratitude and loyalty on our part. 

The only portion of our conduct during this period that could be 
tortured into anything like disloyalty was the Fredonian disturbance 
at Nacogdoches in 1826. And when it is considered by whom these 
disturbances were originated, and by whom quieted, instead of exciting 
the suspicion of government, we respectfully conceive that that trans¬ 
action should have confirmed its confidence in our patriotism. 

The disturbance alluded to originated with some fifteen or twenty 
infatuated individuals. The great mass of the settlers were opposed 
to their mad design, which they testified by capturing the conspirators 
and putting them in custody before the arrival of a single Mexican 
soldier. 

Was there anything in this calculated to awaken the suspicions of 
government ? 

Bad and desperate men there will always be found, in every com¬ 
munity. There will always likewise be a portion capable of being 
easily misled; and is it not really a matter of astonishment that in 
this instance the bad, the desperate, the dissatisfied, and the misguided, 
were limited to so insignificant a number? 

Excepting the disturbance, which was opposed by ninety-nine hun¬ 
dredths of the settlers, and which was quieted by their zeal and 
patriotism, we repeat it, that up to the passage of the Law of the 
6th of April, 1830, our conduct was orderly and patriotic. 

The passage of this law was a mortifying and melancholy occur- 


190 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


rence for Texas. It was mortifying to us, because it must have been 
founded on a suspicion that we were disposed to rebel; such sus¬ 
picions did us great injustice—for we had uniformly exhibited strong 
proofs of our attachment to the Constitution. It was a melancholy 
event for us, for it blasted all our hopes, and was enough to dis¬ 
hearten all our enterprise. It was peculiarly mortifying, because 
it admitted into Texas all other nations, except our friends and coun¬ 
trymen of the United States of the North; except the fathers and 
brothers of many of us, for whom we had emigrated to prepare 
comforts and homes, and whose presence, to gladden our firesides, 
we were hourly anticipating. Yes! this law closed the door of emi¬ 
gration on the only sister Republic worthy of the name, which Mexico 
can boast of in this New World. It closed the door on a people 
among whom the knowledge and foundations of National Liberty are 
more deeply laid than among any other on the habitable globe. It 
closed the door upon a people who would have brought with them 
to Texas those ideas of Republican government in which, from birth, 
they had been educated and practised. In short, it closed the door 
upon a people who, generously and heroically, aided Mexico in her 
revolutionary struggle; and who were the first and foremost to recog¬ 
nize and rejoice at the obtainment of her independence. Is it for a 
moment to be supposed, that the European parasites of power, to 
whom, now alone, the door of emigration is left open 1 —that those 
who have been taught from infancy to disbelieve in the natural equality 
of mankind—who are unacquainted with Constitutions, even in name— 
who, politically speaking, have never been accustomed to think or legis¬ 
late for themselves—who reverence the arm of monarchical rule—who 
pay adulation at the feet of an hereditary nobility—and who have 
contemplated Republics, only in theory, and at a distance—is it, we 
repeat, to be supposed that immigrants of this description will con¬ 
tribute more to the advancement of liberty and the welfare of the 
Republic than emigrants from that land of liberal sentiments, that 
Cradle of Freedom, that Mother of Constitutional Heroes, the United 
States of the North? If such be the fact, habit and education must 
go for nothing, and all experience is set at naught, and contradicted. 

Your memorialists having, as they trust, and respectfully conceive, 
shown to your Honorable Bodies, that their conduct, up to the pas¬ 
sage of the Law of the 6th of April, 1830, was orderly and patriotic 
will now turn your attention to their conduct since that period. 

This law was sufficient to goad us on to madness, inasmuch as 
it blasted all our hopes and defeated all our calculations; inasmuch 
as it showed to us that we were to remain scattered and isolated 
and unhappy tenants of the wilderness of Texas, compelled to gaze 

1 The mass of Europeans are here alluded to.—Many Republicans among 
them are brilliant exceptions to these remarks. [This is a note in the original, 
it is not the editor’s.] 


THE LAW OF APRIL 6, 1830 


191 


upon the resources of a lovely and fertile region, undeveloped for 
want of population, and cut off from the society of fathers and friends 
in the United States of the North—to prepare homes and comforts 
suited to whose age and infirmities many of us had patiently submitted 
to every species of privation. But what was our conduct? As peace¬ 
ful citizens, we submitted. The wheels of government were not re¬ 
tarded in their operation by us. Not a voice nor an arm was uplifted. 
We had confidence in the correct intentions of government, and we 
believed and hoped, that when the momentary excitement of the day 
had subsided a returning sense of justice and liberality would give 
this obnoxious law a brief duration. For more than two years we 
have remained in this peaceful—this unmurmuring attitude. About 
this time, the heroic and patriotic General Santa Anna arose, as the 
vindicator of Liberty and the Constitution. We had confidence in 
the purity of his motives. We believed that the evils which he battled 
to redress were of an alarming and crying magnitude, of no less a 
magnitude than an utter disregard of the Constitution on the part of 
the vice-president and his ministers—with General Santa Anna we 
united, as fellow laborers in the same sacred cause, preferring rather 
to perish in defence of the violated charter of our rights than to live 
in acquiescence to acts of arbitrary and unconstitutional power. What 
we have done in this matter is known to government and to the world. 
It was all in defence of rights, liberties and guaranties that were 
spurned and trampled upon. 

Here, we would ask, what was there in all this to induce a sus¬ 
picion of our disloyalty to the Constitution? Was it our remaining 
quiet for more than two years after the passage of the Law of the 
6 th of April ? Was it in declaring for the Constitution, and in hazard¬ 
ing all we held dear in its defence? Would it not have been as easy 
to have taken advantage of the troubles of the interior, and to have 
declared, and battled for, independence? Was ever a time more 
opportune and inviting? Why did we not then declare for inde¬ 
pendence? Because, in the honest sincerity of our hearts, we assure 
you, and we call Almighty God to witness the truth of the assertion, 
that we did not then, that we do not now wish for independence. No! 
there is not an Anglo-American in Texas whose heart does not beat 
high for the prosperity of the Mexican Republic; who does not cor¬ 
dially and devoutly pray, that all parts of her territory will remain 
united to the end of time; and that she will steadily and rapidly ad¬ 
vance in arts, and in arms, and in agriculture, and in commerce, and 
in manufactures, and in learning, and in virtue, and in freedom, and 
in all that can add to the splendour and happiness of a great nation. 
As an evidence that we wished not for independence, nor for a coales¬ 
cence with the United States of the North, your memorialists would 
respectfully refer your Honorable Bodies to the following fact: 

A short time since, it was rumoured amongst us that the President 


192 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


of the United States of the North, expressed a determination to make 
the Neches, instead of the Sabine river the line between the two Re¬ 
publics. This hitherto unheard of claim provoked the indignation of 
every inhabitant of Texas, and our constituents have, with one voice, 
called upon us to memorialize your Honorable Bodies on the subject 
of the injustice of such a demand. May it please your Honorable 
Bodies, your memorialists trust that they have conclusively shown, 
that the whole tenor of their conduct has been characterized by good 
order and patriotism. 

The destroying influence of the Law of the 6th of April, 1830, 
upon the prospects of Texas has been only incidentally attended to— 
that effect of the law being too obvious to require expatiation or argu¬ 
ment. This law is, likewise, as injurious to the National Revenue 
at large as to us individually: for it is evident that the greatness, the 
power, the wealth, and the independence of a nation depend upon a 
proper development of its resources. Can the resources of Texas be 
properly developed with this law hanging over it? We believe not. 
We believe under such circumstances, it would remain the comparative 
wilderness it now is. 

Experience shows that native Mexicans will not settle in it. But 
should they do so, it would nothing augment the physical force of 
the nation; for it would only be taking population from one part of 
the Republic, to place them in another. Will Europeans settle it? 
We believe Europeans, of the right description to benefit the country 
will not—for thousands of reasons. Our hopes then for a develop¬ 
ment of the resources of Texas are naturally turned to the United 
States of the North: to a people who have been trained in the school 
of Republicanism; whose constitutions are adapted to the climate, and 
who have been brought up to the cultivation of such articles as will 
always be the staples of Texas. Against them, alone, however, the 
door is closed; which, we contend, is equally injurious to us, and to 
the National Revenue. Another point of view in which the Law of 
the 6th of April is objectionable, and has been productive of number¬ 
less difficulties, is this: the garrisons with which all parts of Texas 
have been lately crowded must have grown out of this law and have 
been sent here to enforce it. They could not have been sent here for 
our protection; for when they came we were able to protect ourselves; 
and at the commencement of the settlements, when we were few, and 
weak, and scattered, and defenceless, not a garrison—no; not a sol¬ 
dier, came to our assistance. In the presence and vicinity of these 
garrisons the civil arm has generally been paralized and powerless; 
for many of the officers were law-despisers, who set the political 
authorities at defiance, brought them into contempt, and trespassed, 
in every respect upon the rights and privileges of their fellow-citizens. 
When all of these things are considered, we cannot but believe, that 
the former characteristic justice and liberality of your Honorable 


THE LAW OF APRIL 6, 1830 


193 


Bodies will return to our aid, and bring about an immediate repeal 
of this, to us, ever to be deprecated measure. That justice, that liber¬ 
ality, we now most respectfully, and solemnly, and unanimously, and 
confidently invoke. 


W. H. Wharton, Chairman. 


CHAPTER XVIII 


THE CONVENTION OF 1833 

By Stephen F. Austin and David G. Burnet 

[The most important work of the Convention which met on April I, 1833, 
was to petition the President and Congress of Mexico to separate Texas from 
Coahuila and allow the people to establish a state government of their own. 

The first of the two documents which follow was written by Stephen F. 
Austin. It was written as a sort of explanation for the calling of the Con¬ 
vention. It points out some of the abuses which the Texans had suffered 
because of the connection with Coahuila. The worst abuse, as Austin saw it, 
was the lack of efficient courts and laws. 

The second document was written by David G. Burnet, chairman of the 
committee appointed by the Convention to explain why the Texans wanted a 
state government. 

Austin’s statement is published in The Austin Papers, II, 934-940. Bur¬ 
net’s petition is in Yoakum, History of Texas, I, 469-482. Read in addition, 
Garrison, Texas, Chapter XVI; Barker, The Life of Stephen F. Austin, 
Chapter XIII.] 


I. Texan Grievances 
By Stephen F. Austin 

Gentlemen of the Convention : 

The central committee of safety and correspondence which was 
established by the late convention, and by whose request the present 
convention has assembled, beg leave to offer their sincere congratula¬ 
tions on your arrival at the theatre where you are to exercise the 
high and important duties which devolve upon you as the representa¬ 
tives of the people of your several districts. 

Believing that your deliberations will be fraught with important 
results to the interests of our common country, the committee deem 
it a duty they owe you, as the delegates of the people, to make a 
brief exposition of the reasons which have operated on them in call¬ 
ing this convention, and in doing this, they wish it to be understood, 
not as attempting to dictate to this convention the course it should 
pursue in the least degree, nor to prescribed limits to its action, but 
to give a satisfactory explanation to you, and through you to the 
great body of the people of Texas, of the causes which have impelled 
them to the exercise of this responsible duty. 

The situation of Texas is such as to give rise to great anxiety and 

194 


THE CONVENTION OF 1833 


195 


even alarm in the heart of every person who inhabits it, or feels any 
interest for its prosperity or welfare. 

The whole of this country, with the exception of the small towns 
of Bexar and Goliad, has been settled and redeemed from the wilder¬ 
ness within a few years by the enterprise of immigrants who removed 
to it in consequence of the express and earnest invitation of the gov¬ 
ernment, contained in the national and state colonization laws. Those 
immigrants have uniformly evinced their gratitude to the government 
and nation of their adoption for all the acts of kindness and liberality 
that have been extended towards them, and they have faithfully per¬ 
formed their duty as Mexican citizens, and fulfilled the intention and 
spirit of the colonization laws, by settling the country, defending it 
from hostile Indians, or other enemies, and developing its resources, 
thus giving value and character to a large section of the Mexican ter¬ 
ritory which was before wild and almost unknown. They have intro¬ 
duced agriculture and the useful arts and commerce, and if, as has 
been said by a celebrated author, “that man deserves well of his 
country who makes a blade of grass grow where none grew before,” 
how much more do the people of Texas deserve from their country 
who have so materially added to the national grandeur, physical force 
and resources. The people of Texas ought therefore to rely with con¬ 
fidence on the government for protection, and to expect that an ade¬ 
quate remedy will be applied to the many evils that are afflicting them. 

The invitations in virtue of which they came here, and the guar¬ 
antees of the constitution and laws, evidently contain a pledge on 
the part of the government that they should be governed in accord¬ 
ance with the spirit of the free political institutions of the Mexican 
republic, and in the manner best adapted to the local situation and 
necessities of Texas. The right of the people of Texas to represent 
their wants to the government, and to explain in a respectful man¬ 
ner the remedies that will relieve them, cannot therefore be doubted 
or questioned. It is not merely a right, it is also a sacred and bounden 
duty which they owe to themselves and to the whole Mexican nation, 
for should evils of great and desolating magnitude fall upon Texas 
for the want of competent remedies, the people here would have cause 
to accuse themselves of neglect for not making an effort to procure 
such remedies, and the government would also have cause to com¬ 
plain that a full and frank and timely representation had not been 
made and a remedy solicited. 

It is very evident that these considerations have influenced the 
people of Texas in all they have done up to the present time. They 
have been governed by the desire to do their duty faithfully to the 
Mexican nation and to themselves. In the discharge of this duty the 
people and civil authorities of Austin’s Colony made a respectful and 
humble petition to the general and state governments on the 18 day 
of Feby 1832, setting forth the evils that were afflicting this country. 


196 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


The inhabitants and civil authorities of Bexar, the ancient and pres¬ 
ent capital of Texas, also made a very able and energetic representa¬ 
tion on the same subject on the 19th of December last. Numerous 
other representations have been made at various times by all the 
ayuntamientos of Texas, and on the first of October last delegates 
of the people of Texas met in convention at this town and unanimously 
resolved that it was expedient that the political union between Coa- 
huila and Texas should be dissolved and that Texas should be organ¬ 
ized as a separate state of the Mexican confederation as soon as the 
approbation of the general government to that effect could be obtained. 
That convention accordingly memorialised congress on the subject, 
and elected an agent to go to Mexico in order to forward the views 
of the people of Texas in obtaining the sanction of the general govern¬ 
ment. But the continuation of the intestine commotions which have 
raged within the bosom of the Mexican republic for more than twelve 
months past, and which threatened a total overthrow of the estab¬ 
lished institutions of the country, prevented the memorial from being 
presented in accordance with the intentions of the October conven¬ 
tion. 

That convention adopted many other memorials and resolutions, 
amongst the most important of which was the provisional organiza¬ 
tion of the militia, as a precaution against contemplated attacks upon 
our exposed frontier by the many tribes of hostile Indians who in¬ 
habit the northern and western parts of Texas; and the establishment 
of the central and sub-committees of safety and correspondence 
throughout the country, all of which were rendered inoperative by 
the decree of the governor of the state of Coahuila and Texas, who 
declared the proceedings of the convention null and void and ordered 
the several committees to dissolve. 

At the time when this committee determined to convoke the pres¬ 
ent convention, they took an impartial survey of our federal relations 
and of our local affairs. 

They beheld the Mexican confederation torn and broken asunder 
by political parties, each of which sustained its pretensions to the 
supreme executive power of the nation by force of arms. Civil war 
raged in every part of the Mexican territory, and in looking upon 
the face of the nation nothing was to be seen but confusion and 
bloody discord—Brother contending with brother in deadly strife for 
mastery in political power. They saw that the constitution of the 
republic, that instrument which they had been taught to look upon 
as the. sacred charter of their liberties, was alternately violated and 
set aside by all parties, and that all the constitutional guarantees 
were merged for the time being in military power. They saw the 
constitutional period for the election of President and Vice-President 
of the nation and of members of Congress pass by, and at least one- 
third of the states refuse or neglect to hold the elections. The future 


THE CONVENTION OF 1833 


197 


presented the gloomy prospect that the days of constitutional freedom 
had been numbered to the Mexicans, and that we should ere long 
see the waves of anarchy and confusion close forever over the wreck 
of that Mexican republic. The disorganization of the government 
was so extreme that even the leaders of the liberal party who have 
been contending for the restoration of constitutional liberty, and 
whose cause was espoused by the people of Texas, and generously 
defended with their blood and treasure, found themselves compelled 
to lay aside all the established forms, and to renovate the constitution 
by violent and unconstitutional means. 

The committee turned from this view of our national affairs to 
that of the local internal situation of Texas which has not materially 
changed since the last convention. The political system under which 
Texas has heretofore been governed, tends to check the growth of 
the country, and to produce confusion and insecurity, rather than to 
extened protection to lives, liberty, and property. The unnatural annex¬ 
ation of what was formerly the province of Texas to Coahuila, by 
the constituent congress of the Mexican nation, has forced upon the 
people of Texas a system of laws which they do not understand and 
which cannot be administered so as to suit their condition or to supply 
their wants. 

The alcaldes who are the highest judicial officers in Texas and 
have unlimited jurisdiction in all cases, are elected annually by the 
people, and those who are ignorant and corrupt and without respon¬ 
sibility are as liable to be chosen as the wise, the virtuous and the 
responsible. This remark is justified by the fact that the office is 
without emolument and is extremely burdensome, and will therefore 
seldom be sought by those who are best qualified to fill it. 

In all civil cases there is an appeal to the supreme tribunal of the 
state at Saltillo, a distance of near seven hundred miles from the 
inhabited parts of Texas. There are but few men in Texas who are 
qualified to prepare cases for the supreme court, and when appeals 
have been taken they have generally been sent back several times to 
be reformed so that decisions in such cases are seldom had. It has 
become proverbial in Texas, that an appeal to Saltillo is a payment 
of the debt. It amounts to a total denial of justice, especially to the 
poor, and this is the frail tenure by which the most important rights 
of the people of Texas are suspended. 

The manner of trying culprits for high criminal offences is such 
that it amounts to no trial at all. The trial by jury is not sanctioned 
by law, and the rights of the accused are committed to an alcalde who 
is ignorant of the formulas of the laws and of the language in which 
they are written, who prepares the cause for the judgment of the 
supreme tribunal in Saltillo. Thus the lives, liberty and honor of the 
accused are suspended upon the tardy decision of a distant tribunal 
which knows not nor cares for his suffering, and the rights of the 


198 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


community to bring offenders to speedy and exemplary punishment 
are sacrificed to forms equally uncertain and unknown. 

The formula required by law in the prosecution of criminals is 
so difficult to be pursued that most of the courts in Texas have long 
since ceased to attempt its execution. The trial by jury has been 
attempted in some of the municipalities, but, being unsupported by the 
sanction of law, it also has failed of success. A total interregnum 
in the administration of justice in criminal cases may be said to exist. 
A total disregard of the laws has become so prevalent, both amongst 
the officers of justice and the people at large, that reverence for laws 
or for those who administer them has almost entirely disappeared, 
and contempt is fast assuming its place, so that the protection of our 
property, our persons, and lives is circumscribed almost exclusively to 
the moral honesty or virtue of our neighbors. 

The people and authorities of Bexar in their representation in 
December last, speaking of the judiciary system in Texas, use the fol¬ 
lowing strong and conclusive language: 

“In the judiciary department there never has been any adequate 
organization and it may be said with just cause that in this depart¬ 
ment there is not and never has been any government in Texas.” 

Besides the evils which menace Texas for the want of a judiciary, 
there are others of no less appalling effects. This country is in dan¬ 
ger of being inundated by bands of northern Indians who are remov¬ 
ing from the east side of the Mississippi to Arkansas on our borders. 
Also the Comanche, Tahuacana and other tribes of native Texas 
Indians have recently become hostile and are committing depredations 
on the frontiers. But [it] is unnecessary to enter into details—enough 
is said in the representation of Bexar by the declaration that there is 
not and never has been any adequate government in Texas. 

Judging from the past, it must be considered a vain hope to look 
to the state government of Coahuila and Texas for a redress of 
grievances, or a remedy of wrongs. We have twice beheld the mor¬ 
tifying spectacle of the corrupt mob of the capital driving the legis¬ 
lature by force to adopt measures, unconstitutional in themselves, 
insulting to the inhabitants of Texas, and disregardful of their rights. 
The general neglect of the state Legislature of all the important 
interests and rights of Texas and their repeated violations of the 
constitution are very clearly and energetically set forth in the Bexar 
remonstrance of last December. There seems to be no cause to expect 
any favourable change towards Texas in the politics of Coahuila. 

But even supposing there were, the legislature that would suit 
Coahuila would be pernicious in Texas. No organization can be 
devised under the constitution of the State of Coahuila and Texas 
that would suit the two extremes, separated as they are, more than 
four hundred leagues, a great part through a wilderness that cannot 
be passed without imminent danger from hostile Indians, The dis- 


THE CONVENTION OF 1833 


199 


similarity of habits, occupation, and language also presents still greater 
difficulties than the distance. These difficulties are hard to reconcile 
for the reason that the state constitution requires that all general laws 
shall be the same throughout the whole state. There cannot there¬ 
fore be any organization of the judiciary for Texas materially different 
from that of Coahuila. 

In this state of things the committee considered themselves bound 
by a solemn duty to call on the people of Texas through their repre¬ 
sentatives to meet in general convention with full powers to delib¬ 
erate on the present distracted situation of our infant country and to 
adopt such constitutional measures as in their wisdom they may deem 
necessary. In exercising this highly responsible duty the committee 
did not act unadvisedly or without the most mature deliberation, and 
they did not call this convention until they were satisfied that a large 
majority of the people of Texas were in favor of applying for a well 
organized state government as the only remedy for existing evils. 

The law of the constituent Congress of 7 May, 1824, evidently 
contemplates that Texas should form a separate state. The 2d article 
of that law is in the following words as translated: “Coahuila and 
Texas shall also form another state, but so soon as the latter is 
in a situation to figure as a separate state, it shall inform Congress 
thereof for its resolution.” 

The right which this law confers upon the people of Texas to 
inform Congress when they are in a situation to figure as a state, and 
to apply for admission into the Union, is certainly very clear and 
unequivocal. 

What method may be the best to obtain a remedy for the many 
evils which afflict Texas, can only be determined by the wisdom of 
the convention. Trusting that your deliberations will be conducted 
with that zeal for the public welfare which the common good of our 
adopted country requires and that they will tend to that happy issue 
which all so confidently anticipate, the central committee take leave 
of the convention by depositing the power which they have exercised 
for a time in the hands of those who gave it. 

The Petition of the Convention for Judiciary Reform 

v 

By David G. Burnet 

[The Legal Right of Texas to Have a State Government ] 

Memorial of the Texan Convention of April, 1833, to the General 
Congress of the United Mexican States: 

The inhabitants of Texas, by their representatives elect, in con¬ 
vention assembled, would respectfully approach the national Congress, 
and present this their memorial, praying that the union which was 
established between Coahuila and Texas, whereby the two ancient 


200 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


provinces were incorporated into one free and independent state, 
under the name of “Coahuila and Texas/’ may be dissolved, abro¬ 
gated, and perpetually cease; and that the inhabitants of Texas may 
be authorized to institute and establish a separate state government, 
which will be in accordance with the federal constitution and the 
constitutive act; and that the state so constituted shall be received and 
incorporated into the great confederation of Mexico, on terms of 
equality with the other states of the Union. 

To explain the grounds of this application, your memorialists would 
respectfully invite the attention of the general Congress to the fol¬ 
lowing considerations: 

The consolidation of the late provinces of Coahuila and Texas 
was, in its nature, provisional, and, in its intention, temporary. The 
decree of the sovereign constituent Congress, bearing date the 7th 
of May, 1824, contemplates a separation, and guarantees to Texas 
the right of having a state government whenever she may be in a 
condition to ask for the same. That decree provides that, “so soon 
as Texas shall be in a condition to figure as a state of itself, it shall 
inform Congress thereof, for its resolution.” The implication con¬ 
veyed by this clause is plain and imperative; and vests in Texas as 
perfect a right as language can convey, unless it can be presumed that 
the sovereign constituent Congress, composed of the venerable fathers 
of the republic, designed to amuse the good people of Texas by an 
illusory and disingenuous promise, clothed in all the solemnity of a 
legislative enactment. . . . 

[The Right to Petition for Reforms] 

The general Congress may possibly consider the mode of this com¬ 
munication as informal. To this suggestion we would, with great 
deference, reply, that the events of the past year have not only violated 
the established forms and etiquette of the government, but have sus¬ 
pended, at least, its vital functions; and it would appear exceedingly 
rigorous to exact from the inhabitants of Texas, living on a remote 
frontier of the republic, a minute conformity to unimportant punctilios. 
The ardent desire of the people is made known to the Congress through 
their select representatives, the most direct and unequivocal medium by 
which they can possibly be conveyed; and surely the enlightened Con¬ 
gress will readily concur with us in the sentiment that the wishes and 
wants of the people form the best rule for legislative guidance. 

The people of Texas consider it not only an absolute right, but a 
most sacred and imperative duty to themselves, and to the Mexican 
nation, to represent their wants in a respectful manner to the general 
government, and to solicit the best remedy of which the nature of their 
grievances will admit. Should they utterly fail in this duty, and great 
and irremediable evils ensue, the people would have reason to reproach 


THE CONVENTION OF 1833 


201 


themselves alone; and the general Congress, in whom the remedial 
power resides, would also have reason to censure their supineness and 
want of fidelity to the nation. Under this view, we trust the Congress 
will not regard with excessive severity any slight departure which the 
good people of Texas may in this instance have made from the ordi¬ 
nary formalities of the government. . . . 


[Abuses which Texas Suffers through Union with Coahuila] 

The obvious design of the union between Coahulia and Texas was, 
on one part at least, the more effectually to secure the peace, safety, 
and happiness, of Texas. That design has not been accomplished, 
and facts piled upon facts afford a melancholy evidence that it is 
utterly impracticable. Texas never has and never can derive from the 
connection benefits in any wise commensurate with the evils she has 
sustained, and which are daily increasing in number and in magnitude. 

But our reasons for the proposed separation are more explicitly 
set forth in the subjoined remarks. . . . The two territories are dis¬ 
junct in all their prominent respective relations. 

In point of locality, they approximate only by a strip of sterile 
and useless territory, which must long remain a comparative wilder¬ 
ness, and present many serious embarrassments to that facility of inter¬ 
course which should always exist between the seat of government 
and its remote population. 

In respect to commerce and its various intricate relations, there is 
no community of interests between them. The one is altogether 
interior; is consequently abstracted from all participation in maritime 
concerns; and is naturally indifferent, if not adverse, to any system 
of polity that is calculated to promote the diversified and momentous 
interests of commerce. The other is blest with many natural advan¬ 
tages for extensive commercial operations, which, if properly culti¬ 
vated, would render many valuable accessions to the national marine, 
and a large increase to the national revenues. The importance of an 
efficient national marine is evinced, not only by the history of other 
and older governments, but by the rich halo of glory which encircles 
the brief annals of the Mexican navy. 

In point of climate and of natural productions, the two territories 
are equally dissimilar. Coahuila is a pastoral and a mining country; 
Texas is characteristically an agricultural district. The occupations 
incident to these various intrinsic properties are equally various and 
distinct; and a course of legislation that may be adapted to the en¬ 
couragement of the habitual industry of the one district, might present 
only embarrassment and perplexity, and prove fatally deleterious to 
the prosperity of the other. 

It is not needful, therefore—neither do we desire—to attribute 
any sinister or invidious design to the legislative enactments or to 


202 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the domestic economical policy of Coahuila (whose ascendency in the 
joint councils of the state gives her an uncontrolled and exclusive 
power of legislation), in order to ascertain the origin of the evils that 
affect Texas, and which, if permitted to exist, must protract her feeble 
and dependent pupilage to a period coeval with such existence. Neither 
is it important to Texas whether those evils have proceeded from a 
sinister policy in the predominant influences of Coahuila, or whether 
they are the natural results of a union that is naturally adverse to 
her interests. The effects are equally repugnant and injurious, whether 
emanating from the one or the other source. 

Bexar, the ancient capital of Texas, presents a faithful but a 
gloomy picture of her general want of protection and encouragement. 
Situated in a fertile, picturesque, and healthful region, and established 
a century and a half ago (within which period populous and magnifi¬ 
cent cities have sprung into existence), she exhibits only the decrepi¬ 
tude of age—sad testimonials of the absence of that political guard¬ 
ianship which a wise government should always bestow upon the 
feebleness of its exposed frontier settlements. A hundred and seven¬ 
teen years have elapsed since Goliad and Nacogdoches assumed the 
distinctive name of towns, and they are still entitled only to the diminu¬ 
tive appellation of villages. Other military and missionary establish¬ 
ments have been attempted, but, from the same defect of protection 
and encouragement, they have been swept away, and scarcely a vestige 
remains to rescue their locations from oblivion. 

We do not mean to attribute these specific disasters to the union 
with Coahuila, for we know they transpired long anterior to the con¬ 
summation of that union. But we do maintain that the same political 
causes, the same want of protection and encouragement, the same 
mal-organization and impotency of the local and minor faculties of the 
government, the same improvident indifference to the peculiar and 
vital interests of Texas, exist now that operated then. Bexar is still 
exposed to the depredations of her ancient enemies, the insolent, vin¬ 
dictive, and faithless Comanches. Her citizens are still massacred, 
their cattle destroyed or driven away, and their very habitations threat¬ 
ened, by a tribe of erratic and undisciplined Indians, whose audacity 
has derived confidence from success, and whose long-continued 
aggressions have invested them with a fictitious and excessive terror. 
Her schools are neglected, her churches desolate, the sounds of human 
industry are almost hushed, and the voice of gladness and festivity 
is converted into wailing and lamentation, by the disheartening and 
multiplied evils which surround her defenseless population. Goliad 
is still kept in constant trepidation; is paralyzed in all her efforts for 
improvement; and is harassed on all her borders by the predatory 
incursions of the Wacoes, and other insignificant bands of savages, 
whom a well-organized local government would soon subdue and 
exterminate. 


THE CONVENTION OF 1833 


203 


These are facts, not of history merely, on which the imagination 
must dwell with an unwilling melancholy, but they are events of the 
present day, which the present generation feel in all their dreadful 
reality. And these facts, revolting as they are, are as a fraction only 
in the stupendous aggregate of our calamities. Our misfortunes do 
not proceed from Indian depredations alone; neither are they confined 
to a few isolated, impoverished, and almost-tenantless towns. They 
pervade the whole territory—operate upon the whole population—and 
are as diversified in character as our public interests and necessities 
are various. 

Texas at large feels and deplores an utter destitution of the com¬ 
mon benefits which have usually accrued from the worst system of 
internal government that the patience of mankind ever tolerated. She 
is virtually without a government; and if she is not precipitated into 
all the unspeakable horrors of anarchy, it is only because there is a 
redeeming spirit among the people, which still infuses some moral 
energy into the miserable fragments of authority that exist among us. 

We are perfectly sensible that a large portion of our population, 
usually denominated “the colonists/’ and composed of Anglo-Ameri¬ 
cans, have been greatly calumniated before the Mexican government. 
But could the honorable Congress scrutinize strictly into our real 
condition—could they see and understand the wretched confusion in 
all the elements of government, which we daily feel and deplore—our 
ears would no longer be insulted, nor our feelings mortified, by the 
artful fictions of hireling emissaries from abroad, nor by the malignant 
aspersions of disappointed military commandants at home. 

Our grievances do not so much result from any positive misfea¬ 
sance on the part of the present state authorities. . . . We complain 
more of the want of all the important attributes of government, than 
of the abuses of any. . . . 

It is equally obvious that the happiness of the people is more likely 
to be secured by a local than by a remote government. In the one 
case, the governors are partakers, in common with the governed, in 
all the political evils which result to the community, and have therefore 
a personal interest in so discharging their respective functions as will 
best secure the common welfare. In the other supposition, those 
vested with authority are measurably exempt from the calamities that 
ensue [upon] an abuse of power, and may very conveniently subserve 
their own interests and ambition, while they neglect or destroy “the 
welfare of the associated.” 

[How a State Government Would Benefit Texas] 

But, independent of these general truths, there are some impres¬ 
sive reasons why the peace and happiness of Texas demand a local 
government. Constituting a remote frontier of the republic, and 
bordering on a powerful nation, a portion of whose population, in 


204 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


juxtaposition to hers, is notoriously profligate and lawless, she re¬ 
quires, in a peculiar and emphatic sense, the vigorous application of 
such laws as are necessary, not only to the preservation of good order, 
the protection of property, and the redress of personal wrongs, but 
such also as are essential to the prevention of illicit commerce, to 
the security of the public revenues, and to the avoidance of serious 
collision with the authorities of the neighboring republic. That such 
a judicial administration is impracticable under the present arrange¬ 
ment, is too forcibly illustrated by the past to admit of any national 
hope for the future. 

It is an acknowledged principle in the science of jurisprudence, 
that the prompt and certain infliction of mild and humane punish¬ 
ment is more efficacious for the prevention of crime than a tardy 
and precarious administration of the most sanguinary penal code. 
Texas is virtually denied the benefit of this benevolent rule by the 
locality and the character of her present government. Crimes of 
the greatest atrocity may go unpunished, and hardened criminals 
triumph in their iniquity, because of the difficulties and delays which 
encumber her judicial system, and necessarily intervene [between] 
a trial and conviction, and the sentence and the execution of the law. 

Our “supreme tribunal of justice” holds its sessions upward of seven 
hundred miles distant from our central population; and that distance 
is greatly enlarged, and sometimes made impassable, by the casual¬ 
ties incident to a “mail” conducted by a single horseman through a 
wilderness, often infested by vagrant and murderous Indians. Be¬ 
fore sentence can be pronounced by the local courts on persons 
charged with the most atrocious crimes, a copy of the process must 
be transmitted to an assessor, resident at Leona Vicario (Saltillo), 
who is too far removed from the scene of guilt to appreciate the im¬ 
portance of a speedy decision, and is too much estranged from our 
civil and domestic concerns to feel the miseries that result from a 
total want of legal protection in person and property. But our diffi¬ 
culties do not terminate here. After the assessor shall have found 
leisure to render his opinion, and final judgment is pronounced, it 
again becomes necessary to resort to the capital to submit the tardy 
sentence to the supreme tribunal for “approbation, revocation, or 
modification,” before the judgment of the law can be executed. Here 
we have again to encounter the vexations and delays incident to all 
governments where those who exercise its most interesting functions 
are removed by distance from the people on whom they operate, and 
for whose benefit the social compact is created. 

These repeated delays, resulting from the remoteness of our courts 
of judicature, are pernicious in many respects. They involve heavy 
expenses, which, in civil suits, are excessively onerous to litigants, and 
give to the rich and influential such manifold advantages over the poor 
as operate to an absolute exclusion of the latter from the remedial 


THE CONVENTION OF 1833 


205 


and protective benefits of the law. They offer seductive opportunities 
and incitements to bribery and corruption, and endanger the sacred 
purity of the judiciary, which, of all the branches of the government, 
is most intimately associated with the domestic and social happiness 
of man, and should therefore be, not only sound and pure, but un¬ 
suspected of the venal infection. They present insuperable difficulties 
to the exercise of the corrective right of recusation, and virtually 
nullify the constitutional power of impeachment. In criminal actions 
they are no less injurious. They are equivalent to a license to iniquity, 
and exert a dangerous influence on the moral feelings at large. Be¬ 
fore the tedious process of the law can be complied with, and the 
criminal—whose hands are perhaps imbrued in a brother’s blood— 
be made to feel its retributive justice, the remembrance of his crime 
is partially effaced from the public mind; and the righteous arbitra¬ 
ment of the law, which, if promptly executed, would have received 
universal approbation, and been a salutary warning to evil-doers, is 
impugned as vindictive and cruel. The popular feeling is changed 
from a just indignation of crime into an amiable but mistaken sym¬ 
pathy for the criminal; and an easy and natural transition is con¬ 
verted into disgust and disaffection toward the government and its 
laws. 

These are some of the evils that result from the annexation of 
Texas to Coahuila, and the exercise of legislative and judicial powers 
by the citizens of Coahuila over the citizens of Texas. The cata¬ 
logue might be greatly enlarged, but we forbear to trespass on the 
time of the honorable Congress (confiding to the worthy citizens, who 
shall be charged with the high duty of presenting this memorial, and 
the protocol of a constitution, which the people of Texas have framed, 
as the basis of their future government, the more explicit enunciation 
of them). Those evils are not likely to be diminished, but they may 
be exceedingly aggravated by the fact that that political connection 
was formed without the cordial approbation of the people of Texas, 
and is daily becoming more odious to them. Although it may have 
received their reluctant acquiescence, in its inception, before its evil 
consequences were developed or foreseen, the arbitrary continuance 
of it now, after the experience of nine years has demonstrated its 
ruinous tendencies, would invest it with some of the most offensive 
features of usurpation. Your memorialists entertain an assured con¬ 
fidence that the enlightened Congress of Mexico will never give their 
high sanction to anything that wears the semblance of usurpation, or 
of arbitrary coercion. 

[A Territorial Government Would Not Satisfy Texas] 

The idea may possibly occur, in the deliberations of the honorable 
Congress, that a territorial organization would cure our political 
maladies, and effectuate the great purposes which induce this applica- 


206 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


tion; and plausible reasons may be advanced in favor of it. But the 
wisdom of Congress will readily detect the fallacy of these reasons, 
and the mischief consequent to such vain sophistry. In this remote 
section of the republic, a territorial government must, of necessity, be 
divested of one essential and radical principle in all popular insti¬ 
tutions—the immediate responsibility of public agents to the people 
whom they serve. The appointments to office would, in such case, 
be vested in the general government; and although such appointments 
should be made with the utmost circumspection, the persons appointed, 
when once arrayed in the habiliments of office, would be too far 
removed from the appointing power to feel the restraints of a vigi¬ 
lant supervision and a direct accountability. The dearest rights of 
the people might be violated, the public treasures squandered, and 
every variety of imposition and iniquity practiced, under the spe¬ 
cious pretext of political necessity, which the far-distant government 
could neither detect nor control. 

And we would further present with great deference, that the in¬ 
stitution of a territorial government would confer upon us neither 
the form nor the substance of our high guaranty. It would, indeed, 
diversify our miseries, by opening new avenues to peculation and 
abuse of power; but it would neither remove our difficulties nor place 
us in the enjoyment of our equal and vested rights. The only adequate 
remedy that your memorialists can devise, and which they ardently 
hope the collective wisdom of the nation will approve, is to be found 
in the establishment of a local state government. 

We believe that if Texas were endowed with the faculties of a 
state government, she would be competent to remedy the many evils 
that now depress her energies, and frustrate every effort to develop 
and bring into usefulness the natural resources which a beneficent 
Providence has conferred upon her. 

We believe that a local legislature, composed of citizens who feel 
and participate in all the calamities which encompass us, would be 
enabled to enact such conservative, remedial, and punitive laws, and 
so to organize and put into operation the municipal and inferior 
authorities of the country, as would inspire universal confidence; 
would encourage the immigration of virtuous foreigners—prevent the 
ingress of fugitives from the justice of other countries—check the 
alarming accumulations of ferocious Indians, whom the domestic 
policy of the United States of the North is rapidly translating to our 
borders; would give impulse and vigor to the industry of the people 
—secure a cheerful subordination and a faithful adhesion to the state 
and general governments; and would render Texas what she ought 
to be—a strong arm of the republic, a terror to foreign invaders, and 
an example of peace and prosperity—of advancement in the arts and 
sciences, and of devotion to the Union—to her sister-states. 

We believe that an executive chosen from among ourselves would 


THE CONVENTION OF 1833 


207 


feel a more intense interest in our political welfare, would watch with 
more vigilance over our social concerns, and would contribute more 
effectually to the purposes of his appointment. 

We believe that a local judiciary, drawn from the bosom of our 
own peculiar society, would be enabled to administer the laws with 
more energy and promptitude—to punish the disobedient and refrac¬ 
tory—to restrain the viciousness of the wicked—to impart confidence 
and security, of both person and property, to peaceable citizens—to 
conserve and perpetuate the general tranquillity of the state—and to 
render a more efficient aid to the coordinate powers of the govern¬ 
ment, in carrying into effect the great objects of its institution. 

We believe that, if Texas were admitted to the Union as a sepa¬ 
rate state, she would soon “figure” as a brilliant star in the Mexican 
constellation, and would shed a new splendor around the illustrious 
city of Montezuma. We believe she would contribute largely to the 
national wealth and aggrandizement—would furnish new staples for 
commerce, and new materials for manufactures. The cotton of Texas 
would give employment to the artisans of Mexico; and the precious 
metals, which are now flowing into the coffers of England, would 
be retained at home, to reward the industry and remunerate the in¬ 
genuity of native citizens. 

The honorable Congress need not be informed that a large por¬ 
tion of the population of Texas is of foreign origin. They have been 
invited here by the munificent liberality and plighted faith of the 
Mexican government; and they stand pledged by every moral and 
religious principle, and by every sentiment of honor, to requite that 
liberality, and to reciprocate the faithful performance of the guaranty 
to “protect their liberties, property, and civil rights,” by a cheerful 
dedication of their moral and physical energies to the advancement 
of their adopted country. But it is also apparent to the intelligence 
of the honorable Congress that the best mode of securing the perma¬ 
nent attachment of such a population is to incorporate them into the 
federal system on such equitable terms as will redress every grievance, 
remove every cause of complaint, and insure, not only an identity of 
interests, but an eventual blending and assimilation of all that is now 
foreign and incongruous. . . . 

[We Beg for Relief] 

For these and other considerations, your memorialists would 
solemnly invoke the magnanimous spirit of the Mexican nation, con¬ 
centrated in the wisdom and patriotism of the federal Congress. And 
they would respectfully and ardently pray that the honorable Con¬ 
gress would extend their remedial power to this obscure section of 
the republic; would cast around it “the sovereign mantle of the nation,” 
and adopt it into a free and plenary participation of that “constitu- 


208 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


tional regime” of equal sisterhood which alone can rescue it from 
the miseries of an ill-organized, inefficient, internal government, and 
can reclaim this fair and fertile region from the worthlessness of 
an untenanted waste, or the more fearful horrors of barbarian 
inundation. 

David G. Burnet, Chairman of the Committee. 


CHAPTER XIX 


ON THE NECESSITY OF A CONSULTATION 

By Stephen F. Austin 

[This speech is from The Austin Papers, III, 116-119. Austin had just 
returned to Texas after an absence of twenty-eight months in Mexico, of which 
more than sixteen months were spent in prison or under bond. It gives Austin’s 
opinion of Mexican politics and expresses his conviction that a consultation or 
convention is necessary. 

The letter which follows Austin’s speech was written by Henry Austin to 
his sister, Mrs. M. A. Holley. Henry Austin and Mrs. Holley were cousins of 
Stephen F. Austin.] 

Speech of Colonel Austin , delivered on the 8th of September , 1835, at 

a public dinner in Brazoria, given in honor of his return to Texas 

I cannot refrain from returning my unfeigned thanks for the flat¬ 
tering sentiments with which I have just been honored, nor have I 
words to express my satisfaction on returning to this my more than 
native country, and meeting so many of my friends and companions 
in its settlement. 

I left Texas in April, 1833, as the public agent of the people, for 
the purpose of applying for the admission of this country into the 
Mexican confederation as a state separate from Coahuila. This appli¬ 
cation was based upon the constitutional and vested rights of Texas, 
and was sustained by me in the city of Mexico to the utmost of my 
abilities. No honorable means were spared to effect the objects of 
my mission and to oppose the forming of Texas into a territory, which 
was attempted. I rigidly adhered to the instructions and wishes of 
my constituents, so far as they were communicated to me. My efforts 
to serve Texas involved me in the labyrinth of Mexican politics. I 
was arrested, and have suffered a long persecution and imprisonment. 
I consider it my duty to give an account of these events to my con¬ 
stituents, and will therefore at this time merely observe that I have 
never, in any manner, agreed to anything, or admitted anything, that 
would compromise the constitutional or vested rights of Texas. These 
rights belong to the people, and can only be surrendered by them. 

I fully hoped to have found Texas at peace and in tranquillity, 
but regret to find it in commotion; all disorganized, all in anarchy, 
and threatened with immediate hostilities. This state of things is 
deeply to be lamented; it is a great misfortune, but it is one which 

209 


210 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


has not been produced by any acts of the people of this country: on 
the contrary, it is the natural and inevitable consequence of the revolu¬ 
tion that has spread all over Mexico, and of the imprudent and 
impolitic measures of both the general and state governments, with 
respect to Texas. The people here are not to blame, and cannot be 
justly censured. They are farmers, cultivators of the soil, and are 
pacific from interest, from occupation, and from inclination. They 
have uniformly endeavored to sustain the constitution and the public 
peace by pacific means, and have never deviated from their duty as 
Mexican citizens. If any acts of imprudence have been committed 
by individuals, they evidently resulted from the revolutionary state 
of the whole nation, the imprudent and censurable conduct of the 
state authorities, and the total want of a local government in Texas. 
It is, indeed, a source of surprise and creditable congratulation, that 
so few acts of this description have occurred under the peculiar cir¬ 
cumstances of the times. It is, however, to be remembreed that acts 
of this nature were not the acts of the people, nor is Texas responsible 
for them. They were, as I before observed, the natural conse¬ 
quences of the revolutionary state of the Mexican nation; and Texas 
certainly did not originate the revolution, neither have the people, as 
a people, participated in it. The consciences and hands of the Texians 
are free from censure, and clean. 

The revolution in Mexico is drawing to a close. The object is to 
change the form of government, destroy the federal constitution of 
1824, and establish a central or consolidated government. The states 
are to be converted into provinces. 

Whether the people of Texas ought or ought not to agree to this 
change, and relinquish all or a part of their constitutional and vested 
rights under the constitution of 1824, is a question of the most vital 
importance; one that calls for the deliberate consideration of the 
people, and can only be decided by them, fairly convened for the 
purpose. As a citizen of Texas I have no other right, and pretend 
to no other. In the report which I consider it my duty to make to 
my constituents, I intend to give my views on the present situation of 
the country, and especially as to the constitutional and natural rights 
of Texas, and will, therefore, at this time, merely touch this subject. 

Under the Spanish government, Texas was a separate and distinct 
local organization. It was one of the unities that composed the general 
mass of the nation, and as such participated in the war of the revolu¬ 
tion, and was represented in the constituent congress of Mexico, that 
formed the constitution of 1824. This constituent congress, so far 
from destroying this unity, expressly recognized and confirmed it by 
the law of May 7, 1824, which united Texas with Coahuila provi¬ 
sionally, under the especial guarantee of being made a state of the 
Mexican confederation, as soon as it possessed the necessary elements. 
That law and the federal constitution gave to Texas a specific political 


ON THE NECESSITY OF A CONSULTATION 211 


existence, and vested in its inhabitants special and defined rights, 
which can only be relinquished by the people of Texas, acting for 
themselves as a unity, and not as a part of Coahuila, for the reason 
that the union with Coahuila, was limited , and only gave power to 
the state of Coahuila and Texas to govern Texas for the time being, 
but always subject to the vested rights of Texas. The state, there¬ 
fore, cannot relinquish those vested rights, by agreeing to the change 
of government, or by any other act, unless expressly authorized by 
the people of Texas to do so; neither can the general government of 
Mexico legally deprive Texas of them without the consent of this 
people. These are my opinions. 

An important question now presents itself to the people of this 
country. 

The federal constitution of 1824 is about to be destroyed, the sys¬ 
tem of government changed, and a central or consolidated one estab¬ 
lished. Will this act annihilate all the rights of Texas, and subject 
this country to the uncontrolled and unlimited dictation of the new 
government ? 

This is a subject of the most vital importance. I have no doubts 
the federal constitution will be destroyed, and a central government 
established, and that the people will soon be called upon to say whether 
they agree to this change or not. This matter requires the most calm 
discussion, the most mature deliberation, and the most perfect union. 
How is this to be had? I see but one way, and that is by a general 
consultation of the people by means of delegates elected for that pur¬ 
pose, with full powers to give such an answer, in the name of Texas, 
to this question, as they may deem best, and to adopt such measures 
as the tranquillity and salvation of the country may require. 

It is my duty to state that General Santa Anna verbally and 
expressly authorized me to say to the people of Texas, that he was 
their friend, that he wished for their prosperity, and would do all he 
could to promote it; and that, in the new constitution, he would use 
his influence to give to the people of Texas a special organization, 
suited to their education, habits, and situation. Several of the most 
intelligent and influential men in Mexico, and especially the Ministers 
of Relations and War, expressed themselves in the same manner. 
These declarations afford another and more urgent necessity for a 
general consultation of all Texas, in order to inform the general 
government, and especially General Santa Anna, what kind of organ¬ 
ization will suit the education, habits, and situation of this people. 

It is also proper for me to state that, in all my conversation with 
the president and ministers and men of influence, I advised that no 
troops should be sent to Texas, and no cruisers along the coast. I 
gave it as my decided opinion, that the inevitable consequence of 
sending an armed force to this country would be war. I stated that 
there was a sound and correct moral principle in the people of Texas, 


212 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


that was abundantly sufficient to restrain or put down all turbulent 
or seditious movements, but that this moral principle could not, and 
would not unite with any armed force sent against this country; on 
the contrary, it would resist and repel it, and ought to do so. This 
point presents another strong reason why the people of Texas should 
meet in general consultation. This country is now in anarchy, threat¬ 
ened with hostilities; armed vessels are capturing everything they 
can catch on the coast, and acts of piracy are said to be committed 
under cover of the Mexican flag. Can this state of things exist with¬ 
out precipitating the country into a war? I think it cannot, and 
therefore believe that it is our bounden and solemn duty as Mexicans, 
and as Texians, to represent the evils that are likely to result from this 
mistaken and most impolitic policy in the military movement. 

My friends, I can truly say that no one has been, or is now, more 
anxious than myself to keep trouble away from this country. No one 
has been, or now is more faithful to his duty as a Mexican citizen, 
and no one has personally sacrificed or suffered more in the discharge 
of this duty. I have uniformly been opposed to have anything to 
do with the family political quarrels of the Mexicans. Texas needs 
peace, and a local government: its inhabitants are farmers, and they 
need a calm and quiet life. But how can I, or any one, remain indif¬ 
ferent, when our rights, our all, appear to be in jeopardy, and when 
it is our duty, as well as our obligation as good Mexican citizens, to 
express our opinions on the present state of things, and to represent 
our situation to the government? It is impossible. The crisis is such 
as to bring it home to the judgment of every man that something 
must be done, and that without delay. The question will perhaps 
be asked, what are we to do? I have already indicated my opinion. 
Let all personalities, or divisions, or excitements, or passion, or vio¬ 
lence, be banished from among us. Let a general consultation of the 
people of Texas be convened as speedily as possible, to be composed 
of the best, and most calm, and intelligent, and firm men in the coun¬ 
try, and let them decide what representations ought to be made to 
the general government, and what ought to be done in future. 

With these explanatory remarks I will give a toast— The constitu¬ 
tional rights and the security and peace of Texas—they ought to he 
maintained; and jeopardized as they now are, they demand a general 
consultation of the people. 


Brasoria, io Sept., 1835. 

My dear Sister: 

Stephen has at last arrived. I rode all night through the swamp and rain 
to meet him at Perry’s. His arrival unites all parties. We, the Republicans, 
have striven hard to keep all quiet until his arrival with certain intelligence 
of the movements and intentions of the Mexican Government, and thanks be 
to God have succeeded with the exception of a few acts of the War party, not 
compromising the whole people. 


ON THE NECESSITY OF A CONSULTATION 213 


Now we meet on middle grounds. Strict Republican Principles. That is, 
to stand upon our constitutional and vested rights—reject the Centralismo Plan 
if offered to us, and if they send a force to fight us to repell force by force. 

United we have nothing to fear. If compelled to take arms in defence of 
our republican and natural rights, republican institutions and principles against 
despotism—that Just, Holy and Omnipotent Judge who ever decides in favor 
of the righteous cause, will be our sword and our shield and the Texians 
will be as safe as the Israelites in the land of the Philistines. 

With such a cause we shall command the sympathies of our republican 
friends in the North and of the friends of freedom throughout the world. 
Should Santa Anna march against us with the Mexican army, the Republicans 
in the South will rise and make a diversion in our favor. 

A Grand Dinner and Ball were got up for the occasion on two days' notice 
in a manner very creditable to the committee and port—the only thing I did 
not like was 7$ a head for ball and supper and $30 more for a decent suit 
of clothes which I had not and could have done without. There were sixty 
covers and despite the short notice, the table was three times filled by men 
alone. In the evening the long room was filled to a Jam. At least sixty or 
eighty ladies who danced the sun up, and the Oyster Creek girls would not 
have quit then had not the room been wanted for breakfast. You never saw 
such enthusiasm. 

Mrs. Phelps is here with Almira and the two Miss Munsons; they go home 
today. Stephen left last night to be at San Felipe on the 12th when all the 
upper world is to be there. I stay to correct the proof sheets of the address 
and then go to San Felipe to close our land business. Within a year every 
league will be worth 40,000$. I will write the girls from home. Perhaps in 
time for this packet. Father's blessing upon his children and sister. 

Your Brother. 

Say to my dear daughters I found their affectionate letters here on my 
return from Perry’s, have had scarcely time to read, much less answer them. 
I shall get part of my crop off for N Orleans within six weeks. I order the 
product to you except so much as may be indispensable to my own wants. At 
present I have not enough money to buy a good horse and no one sells on 
credit. 

With this you ought to receive the handbill and newspapers giving all 
particulars. 

[Addressed:] Mrs M Austin Holley Lexington Kentucky—Mail. 

Reed. Oct. 11, 1835. 


CHAPTER XX 


THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT DURING THE TEXAS 
REVOLUTION 

By Dudley G. Wooten 

[This selection is from Wooten’s A Complete History of Texas for Schools 
and Colleges (Dallas, 1899), 197-205. Read also: Garrison, Texas, Chapter 
XVII; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 108-113; 
Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, V, 269-346, VII, 250-278, 
IX, 227-261, XI, 1-55, XV, 173-185; Barker, The Austin Papers, III, 165-300; 
Barker, The Life of Stephen F. Austin, Chapter XVI.] 

The Consultation; The Provisional Government; Preparations 

for War 

The General Consultation of all Texas, called to meet for October 
16, 1835, did not organize on that day owing to the absence of a quo¬ 
rum, many of the delegates being with the army at Gonzales. The 
organization was postponed to November 1, and on that date, there 
still being a number absent, the proceedings were deferred until 
November 3—Austin’s birthday. The general council, or central 
executive committee, which had been previously formed by the munic¬ 
ipalities, had been up to that time the only government for all the 
colonies, and it had not been able to do much. It had a delicate and 
difficult question to deal with, in satisfying the Cherokee and Cushatta 
Indians, who were becoming very restless and even clamorous about 
their settlements in Eastern Texas. They had built villages and 
engaged in farming, to some extent, near Nacogdoches and along the 
Neches and Trinity, and they were anxious to have the titles to their 
lands confirmed. In a critical moment like this it would not do to 
incur their hostility, and every effort was made to pacify them. Both 
Austin and Houston wrote to them in October, 1835, assuring them 
that their lands and rights would be protected; and they were invited 
to send a representative to the Consultation. 

The council managed to keep up a weekly mail through Texas 
and to the United States. The Telegraph was published weekly by 
Baker and Borden at San Felipe, and ‘‘The Emigrant’s Guide” was 
about starting at Nacogdoches; so that the colonists were kept in¬ 
formed of passing events. The council also appointed Sims Hall 
army contractor, and Thomas F. McKinney financial agent to contract 

214 


THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT 


215 


a loan of one hundred thousand dollars in New Orleans. These acts 
were regular and apparently necessary, and the action of the council 
was afterwards approved by the Consultation. 

The Consultation finally met on November 3, fifty-five delegates 
being present, representing thirteen municipalities. Branch T. Archer 
was elected president of the body, and a committee was appointed, 
with John A. Wharton as chairman, to prepare a declaration of the 
causes which impelled the colonists to take up arms against Mexico; 
while another committee, of which Henry Millard was chairman, was 
appointed to draft a plan for a provisional government for Texas. 
The question of whether the colonists should declare their absolute 
independence came up and was warmly discussed. Perhaps all the 
delegates wished for such action and believed it would soon come, 
but it was not then thought to be prudent and wise to so declare. 
The motion for a Declaration of Independence was defeated by a 
vote of fifteen yeas to thirty-three nays. John A. Wharton led the 
debate in favor of independence, while D. C. Barrett led the opposition 
to it. Houston also opposed an immediate declaration of independ¬ 
ence. The declaration of grievances reported by the committee and 
adopted, set forth fully all the despotic and unconstitutional acts of 
the Mexican government, as they have appeared in the history of the 
preceding ten years, and declared for the Constitution of 1824. The 
plan of the provisional government, agreed upon on November 13, 
provided for the election by the Consultation of a provisional governor 
and lieutenant-governor, and an advisory council composed of one 
member from each municipality. Henry Smith was elected governor 
and James W. Robinson, lieutenant-governor. It was desired to elect 
Austin provisional governor, but he was with the army at San Antonio, 
and it was thought that his services would be more valuable as one 
of the commissioners to the United States, to which position he was 
appointed, with Branch T. Archer and William H. Wharton. Wharton 
at first declined, for the reason that he was in favor of declaring the 
absolute independence of Texas. He argued that anything short of such 
a declaration would accomplish nothing; that all Mexico would unite 
against Texas, no matter what was done; and that nothing could be 
expected from the United States in the way of men, money, or sym¬ 
pathy so long as the colonists occupied the position of a revolted 
province of Mexico, still claiming allegiance to the Mexican consti¬ 
tution. He was, however, at last prevailed upon to accept the posi¬ 
tion of commissioner, upon the assurance that what he desired would 
very soon be accomplished. In December the commissioners set out 
for the United States. 

The Consultation provided for a commander-in-chief of the army, 
and Sam Houston was elected to that rank, while the organization of 
a regular army of eleven hundred and twenty men was ordered, and 
one hundred and fifty Rangers on the frontier. A loan of one million 


216 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


dollars was authorized; all land commissioners were suspended and 
no further land titles could be issued; the fraudulent and illegal land 
grants made by the legislature of Coahuila and Texas were declared 
void; and it was solemnly enacted that the Cherokee and other friendly 
Indians should be secured in the titles and peaceable possession of 
their lands in Eastern Texas. The Consultation adjourned on Novem¬ 
ber 14 to meet March 1, 1836, the adjourned meeting to be composed 
of the same delegates unless the council should order an election 
for new delegates. 

As soon as the provisional government began operations, an unfor¬ 
tunate hostility arose between the governor and the council. It would 
be a waste of time to undertake to decide who was right in the various 
controversies that arose, or to enter into the details of their differ¬ 
ences. The continual disagreement between Governor Smith and 
his council paralyzed the government, and prevented the organization 
of the army for a month. It progressed to the point of the most 
violent and abusive language on both sides, and finally resulted in the 
council adopting a resolution deposing the governor, although he still 
claimed and continued to exercise such authority as he could. The 
plan of the provisional government provided that the commander of 
the army should be “subject to the governor and council,” but as the 
latter could never agree among themselves, General Houston was 
powerless to do anything. The spectacle of this disgraceful contro¬ 
versy disgusted everybody, discouraged the colonists, and well-nigh 
drove away the sympathy and aid of the outside world. It was but 
another example of the folly, so often demonstrated in modern times, 
of placing the military operations of a revolutionary war under the 
control of a political government. 

At last, on December 13, General Houston secured such action 
from the governor and council as enabled him to proceed to organize 
a regular army. The council declared that all soldiers in the regular 
army should receive six hundred and forty acres of land as a 
bounty, which was afterwards increased to eight hundred acres; all 
volunteers in the war against Mexico should receive six hundred and 
forty acres; and all persons who should leave Texas in her then con¬ 
dition forfeited their lands entirely. Houston issued a proclamation, 
setting forth these inducements and calling for soldiers to enter the 
service, but the continual conflict in the provisional government greatly 
retarded all his efforts. 

Meanwhile, the sentiment in favor of the declaration of absolute 
independence from Mexico grew apace among the people. In Novem¬ 
ber and December public meetings were held in Nacogdoches and 
Brazoria, which adopted resolutions to that effect, and on December 
20, at Goliad, ninety-two citizens drew up, adopted, and signed a 
declaration “that the former province and department of Texas is, 
and of right ought to be, a free, sovereign, and independent state.” 


THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT 


217 


Major Ira Ingram got up this movement, and he was aided by Captain 
Philip Dimmitt’s volunteer company and the citizens of Goliad. 
Thirty-one out of the ninety-two signers belonged to the Irish colonies 
of San Patricio and Refugio. 

About this time the country was agitated by the scheme of an 
expedition to capture Matamoros. Dr. James Grant, who owned 
valuable estates in Northern Mexico, seems to have started this 
scheme, and it was favored by Colonels Francis W. Johnson and 
J. W. Fannin. The soldiers were idle and restless, and there was a 
desire to engage in some sort of desperate enterprise against Mexico. 
General Houston and Governor Smith were opposed to the expedi¬ 
tion, but it seemed impossible to prevent the volunteers who had gath¬ 
ered in the west from taking part in the movement, and to preserve 
the enthusiasm of the men the Matamoros raid was partially author¬ 
ized by the commander-in-chief. The council was wholly committed 
to the expedition, and in January, 1836, it went so far as to ignore 
General Houston’s authority by appointing Johnson and Fannin as 
agents to raise troops and prosecute an independent warfare on 
Mexico. This was clearly beyond the powers of the council, amounted 
to setting aside the general of the regular army, and it led to most 
serious consequences. All the confusion and disaster that followed in 
the spring of 1836 were traceable to this Matamoros scheme and the 
arbitrary action of the council in regard to it. The troops were 
stationed throughout the western country under separate chiefs, the 
soldiers were in doubt as to what would be the next move, the officers 
were involved in controversies with the government and with each 
other, and what should have been a united and well organized army 
under one competent commander became a disorganized and discord¬ 
ant force, made up of widely scattered detachments engaged in push¬ 
ing the individual plans of their several leaders. The fall of the 
Alamo and the massacre at Goliad were among the terrible results 
of such a policy. 

The financial condition of Texas at this time was very critical. 
The people were poor and the provisional government had no funds. 
Private aid came from many sources in and out of the province, 
Mobile and New Orleans being especially generous in their contribu¬ 
tions. The finance committee of the council recommended a system 
of taxation and customs duties which would provide necessary funds 
for the future; but what was needed then was money and supplies 
to conduct the war, and these must be had at once. A public loan 
was the only remedy, and for the negotiation of this the people looked 
to their commissioners in the United States. 

In November, 1835, Mexico sent two warships, the Bravo and 
the Montezuma, to the Texas coast, and began to do great harm to 
the importation and exportation of merchandise in Texas. In the 
interior of Mexico extensive preparations were made for the second 


218 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


invasion to subdue the Texans. A large army was collected at San 
Luis Potosi in November and December, to be led to Bexar by 
Santa Anna in person; Urrea was sent to defend Matamoros and 
to march thence to Goliad; Cos was at Laredo, where he had been 
joined by Sesma with fifteen hundred fresh troops, so that, unknown 
to the colonists, the storm was gathering beyond the Rio Grande. 

On December 25, 1835, General Houston removed his headquarters 
to Washington, on the Brazos, where he met two companies of volun¬ 
teers from Alabama under Colonel Wyatt; while about the same time 
the famous Georgia Battalion, under Major William Ward, arrived 
at San Felipe. Houston had been industriously trying to concentrate 
the regular troops at Goliad and Refugio, and the supplies at Copano 
and Matagorda on the coast. On December 30 he ordered all volun¬ 
teers to gather at Copano and to remain there for further orders. 
These dispositions were all upset by the Matamoros excitement in 
January, and San Antonio was left practically undefended by the 
departure of men from there to join that expedition. On January 8, 
General Houston set out for the west, having appointed Colonel Travis 
chief of the recruiting service, and ordered Colonels T. J. Rusk, J. K. 
Allen, and A. Horton to report at headquarters. At this time Gen¬ 
eral Houston expressed himself as convinced that absolute independ¬ 
ence was the only course for Texas to pursue, and almost at the same 
date General Austin wrote to Houston from New Orleans, expressing 
the same conviction. 

Houston reached Goliad on January 16, ordered the command of 
Colonel R. C. Morris to proceed to Refugio, and on the 17th he sent 
Bowie with thirty men to Colonel Neill at San Antonio, with orders 
to destroy the fortifications there and retire with the artillery to 
Goliad, as the position could not be held with the small force then 
there. Captain Smith was also directed to raise a hundred men and 
go to San Antonio; it having been learned that a Mexican force 
of one thousand men were marching on that place. Neill replied 
that he had no teams to move the cannon, and therefore did not destroy 
the fortifications. Only eighty men were now left at Bexar, and 
Governor Smith assumed the authority to remove Travis from his 
position as recruiting officer, and sent him to San Antonio with a 
small command. Travis called for men and money. Of the latter 
there was none, and the former were few to respond in the disordered 
condition then prevailing. 

Meanwhile, the Matamoros expedition was being still nursed by 
Grant, Fannin, and Johnson, supported by the council, and it operated 
as a counter-movement to anything attempted by the commander- 
in-chief. Houston reached Refugio and learned that no supplies had 
been gathered at Copano, as he had directed. On January 20, Colonel 
Francis W. Johnson arrived at Refugio and informed General Hous¬ 
ton that the council had deposed Governor Smith, and had appointed 


THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT 


219 


Colonel Fannin and himself agents to raise troops and supplies and 
invade Mexico by taking Matamoros. Houston’s conduct was simple 
and natural. One branch of the provisional government had assumed 
to destroy the other, thereby practically destroying itself. It had 
ignored the military organization established by the Consultation, by 
superseding the commander of the army with independent agents of 
its own, and all discipline, unity, and intelligence of action were 
rendered impossible. General Houston at once returned to Washing¬ 
ton and reported the facts to Governor Smith. 

By a previous order of the council, General Houston, John Forbes, 
and John Cameron had been appointed to make a treaty with the 
Cherokee Indians and their associate bands, for the purpose of carry¬ 
ing out the solemn promise made by the Consultation in reference to 
securing the Indians in the title to their lands. By order of the gov¬ 
ernor, General Houston was granted a furlough until March I, and 
directed to proceed on his mission to the Indians. He and Forbes 
went to Chief Bowles’s village, and, on February 23, 1836, entered 
into a treaty in accordance with the action of the Consultation. This 
treaty was never formally ratified by the government of Texas. 

Turning now to Mexico, we find Santa Anna at Saltillo in Janu¬ 
ary, 1836, whence, on the 1st of February, he set out for Texas at 
the head of six thousand men. He reached the Rio Grande on the 
12th, and sent General Jose Urrea to Matamoros, whence the latter, 
on February 18, marched with about seven hundred men to attack 
Johnson and Grant at San Patricio, arriving there on the 27th. 

» Santa Anna’s generals in this expedition, besides Urrea, were Filisola, 
Sesma, Gaona, Tolsa, Castrillon, Andrade, Woll, and Cos. Marching 
from the Rio Grande in February, Santa Anna’s army reached the 
heights of the Alazan, overlooking San Antonio, on the 23d—the spot 
where the “Republican Army of the North” had so signally routed 
Elisondo in 1813. The recovery of Bexar by the Mexicans was about 
to begin. Texas was not well prepared for the ensuing conflict, but 
her people felt no fear, trusting in the bravery of their men and the 
justice of their cause. The commissioners to the United States had 
met with reasonable success. Austin made a great speech in Louisville, 
Kentucky, which was widely circulated and aroused much sympathy 
and enthusiasm for the struggling colonists. Colonel William Christy, 
of New Orleans, was the faithful friend and helper of Texas in this 
crisis, and by his aid the commissioners secured a loan of two hun¬ 
dred thousand dollars—ten per cent in cash and the balance in instal¬ 
ments—and another cash loan of fifty thousand dollars. 

The people at large, however, seemed strangely indifferent to the 
approaching danger, and it was with the greatest difficulty they could 
be aroused. This was largely due to the general disgust at the pro¬ 
visional government and its unseemly discords, which continued to 
paralyze the army and dishearten everybody. In spite of this con- 


220 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


tinual trouble between the governor and the council, some good 
measures were adopted, which formed the basis for the subsequent 
legislative system of the Republic and State. . . . 

As a result of the general and growing sentiment in favor of the 
absolute independence of Texas from Mexico, on December io, 1835, 
the council had passed an ordinance providing for an election to be 
held throughout Texas on February 1, 1836, to select delegates to a 
general convention to be assembled at Washington on March 1, for 
the purpose of forming and declaring an independent government for 
Texas, destined to place her among the sovereign republics of the 
world. To that declaration and its vindication on the field of battle 
we have now come. 


CHAPTER XXI 


THE CAMPAIGN OF 1835 

By Ethel Zivley Rather 

[This selection is from Ethel Zivley Rather’s “DeWitt's Colony,” in the 
Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, VIII, 149-157. See also: 
Garrison, Texas, Chapter XVII; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School His¬ 
tory of Texas, 100-107.] 

I. The Battle of Gonzales 

The colonists were now no longer in doubt as to Mexico’s inten¬ 
tions ; consequently, their own attitude was no longer ambiguous. They 
knew that there were at Bexar eighteen pieces of unmounted cannon 
besides those mounted, and that this one was not needed there as 
Ugartechea claimed. They well understood that the only object the 
Mexicans had in getting possession of it was to disarm such Anglo- 
Americans as might prove dangerous neighbors. And they quite as 
clearly foresaw that a refusal to give up the gun would bring the 
government troops upon them. When they met to consider the answer 
to make when these troops should come, only three of the citizens 
were in favor of granting Ugartechea’s request. 

The people therefore began to prepare for the trouble that they 
knew would ensue. Those who lived on the west bank of the Guada¬ 
lupe began to move into Gonzales. The townspeople began to get 
their wagons ready to move their families out—some east to the 
Colorado, some only into the woods to hide. Messengers were at 
once dispatched to various points in Texas for help. The cannon 
was buried in George W. Davis’s peach orchard, and the ground was 
plowed and smoothed over it. 

Finally, on September 26th, while the corporal was still waiting 
across the river, Andrew Ponton sent by another messenger the fol¬ 
lowing reply to the political chief: 

Gonzales Sept 26th 1835 

Excellent Sir 

I received an order purporting to have come from you for a certain piece 
of Ordnance which is in this place. It happened that I was absent and so was 
the remainder part of the Ayuntamiento when your dispatch arrived in conse¬ 
quence the men who bore sd dispatch were necessarily detained untill to day 

221 


222 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


for an answer. This is a matter of delicasy to me nor do I know without 
further information how to act this cannon was as I have always been in¬ 
formed given in perpetuity to this Town for its defense against the Indians. 
The dangers which existed at the time we received this cannon still exist and 
for the same purposes it is still needed here—our common enemy is still to be 
dreaded or prepared against. 

How or in what manner such arms are appropriated throughout the country 
I am as yet ignorant but am lead to believe that dispositions of this nature 
should be permanent at least as long as the procuring cause exists. I must 
therefore I hope be excused from delivering up the sd cannon untill I have 
obtained more information on the subject matter At least untill I have an 
opportunity of consulting the chief of this department on the subject—as well 
to act without precipitation—as to perform strictly and clearly my duty, and 
I assure you, that if, after a mature deliberation on the subject, I find it to be 
my duty & in justice to your self—I obligate my self to comply with your 
demands—and will without delay send the cannon to you. 

God & Liberty— 

Andrew Ponton, Alcalde. 


As soon as this reply was received, Ugartechea, on September 27, 
sent Lieutenant Castaneda to Gonzales at the head of one hundred 
dragoons and bearing letters from himself and the political chief. 
This time the cannon was demanded. Without awaiting the answer 
of their own political chief the people were to deliver it at once. 
Otherwise, Castaneda was to bring the alcalde of Gonzales to Bejar 
as prisoner and to punish all who should offer resistance. 

Before Castaneda reached Gonzales, on the 29th, he sent forward 
two soldiers with these letters, but within three leagues of the place 
he met the messengers returning without having delivered the letters. 
They were accompanied by another soldier, Isabel de la Garsa, who 
had a somewhat disconcerting story to tell. On the day before, at 
four o’clock in the afternoon, ten or twelve Americans had crossed 
the river, disarmed Corporal De Leon and the soldiers, and taken them 
and the cart drivers into town as prisoners. He himself had escaped 
by hiding when sent by the Americans for the horses. Nevertheless, 
Castaneda continued his journey, and within one-eighth of a league 
from Gonzales he met one of the cart drivers, who had been set at 
liberty. This man confirmed Garsa’s report, adding that for two 
days reinforcements had been coming into Gonzales; that their num¬ 
ber was now about two hundred men, and that more were expected 
to arrive in the afternoon. 

Shortly before hearing this last account, Castaneda had a second 
time sent forward the two letters together with one of his own asking 
for an interview with the alcalde. The reply came back that the 
alcalde was absent, but that he was expected to return within three 
hours, when he would send an answer for himself. Castaneda could 
do nothing but await this answer, for he was prevented by the 
Americans from fording the river, and the ferryboat and canoes were 


THE CAMPAIGN OF 1835 


223 


on the other side under guard. While he waited he wrote to Ugar- 
techea a detailed report of all that had taken place. 

On the morning of the next day Castaneda went to the bank of 
the river to have his interview with the alcalde. There he was 
met by the regidor and told that the alcalde was still absent, but that 
he had been sent for, and would surely return soon. The regidor 
promised that at four o’clock in the afternoon Castaneda might speak 
with the alcalde, or, if the latter were still absent, with himself. At 
the appointed hour Castaneda returned to the bank of the river where 
he met the regidor and three other men. The regidor refused to cross 
over, as he had promised, but read to Castaneda from across the 
stream the following communication: 

In the absence of the alcalde it has fallen to my lot to reply to the com¬ 
munication sent to him asking a second time for the cannon. . . . The right 
of consulting with our political chief seems to be denied us. Therefore my 
reply reduces itself to this: I can not nor do I desire to deliver up the 
cannon, . . . and this is the sentiment of all the members of the ayuntamiento 
now present. The cannon is in the town, and only through force will we 
yield. We are weak and few in number, nevertheless we are contending for 
what we believe to be just principles. 

Castaneda replied that they had no right to retain the cannon 
which had been lent as a favor, and maintained that it was an outrage 
to keep as prisoners the corporal and soldiers who had come for it. 
But the regidor only repeated the substance of the letter above. 

In the afternoon Castaneda learned through a Cosate [Coshatti] 
Indian who had been in Gonzales that reinforcements were continuing 
to arrive. It was necessary to do something at once. Hitherto he 
had been unable to cross the river at the town. He therefore decided 
that unless he received other orders from Ugartechea he would try 
to effect a crossing further up the stream. That night he spent in 
camp on the mound at the DeWitt place, about three hundred yards 
from the river. The next morning at twelve o’clock he moved up 
the stream some seven miles and encamped in a very strong position 
upon Ezekiel Williams’s place. 

Castaneda had not been misinformed as to the arrival of volunteers 
in Gonzales. At first there were only eighteen men to defend the 
town. By the 30th there were between one hundred and fifty and 
one hundred and sixty, and more were expected to arrive that day. 
For the immediate emergency they organized with John H. Moore as 
colonel and J. W. E. Wallace as lieutenant-colonel. The cannon was 
unearthed and mounted upon a broad-tired ox-wagon by Mr. Darst, 
Mr. Sowell, Mr. Chisholm and others. Chisholm and Sowell, both 
of whom were blacksmiths, prepared shot for it by cutting up pieces 
of chains and forging iron balls out of such scraps as they could 
procure. 


224 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


When the Mexicans began to move up the river the Texans, sus¬ 
pecting that their object was either to await reinforcements from 
Bejar or to ford the river at the crossing fifteen miles above, deter¬ 
mined to attack them before either of these plans could materialize. 
On Thursday night, October i, at seven o’clock, the Texans, fifty of 
whom were mounted, crossed the river carrying with them the brass 
cannon. On the other side of the river they held a council of war, 
and listened to a “patriotic address” by Rev. W. P. Smith, a Metho¬ 
dist preacher from Rutersville. They then marched up the river, and 
at about four o’clock in the morning formed for action. The mounted 
men were placed in front of the cannon; on either side was a detach¬ 
ment of footmen accompanied by flankers on the right and left. A 
small guard brought up the rear. In this order they marched silently 
to the place they intended to occupy. Just as they reached it the 
Texan advance guard was fired upon by the Mexican pickets, and 
one man was slightly wounded. The Mexicans at once formed. The 
two columns of Texan footmen deployed into line with the horse¬ 
men on the extreme right and the cannon in the center. A dense fog 
made it difficult for either side to move with advantage, and the Texans 
therefore kept their places until daylight. The Mexicans occupied 
a commanding position on a slight eminence. As soon as it was light 
enough, the Texans advanced into the open prairie until within three 
hundred and fifty yards of the Mexicans, and opened fire. The 
Mexicans retreated, and then proposed a parley. 

By this time the fog had lifted, and Colonel Moore and Lieutenant 
Castaneda advanced to meet each other in full view of the opposing 
forces. Castaneda asked why the Mexicans had been attacked. 
Colonel Moore replied that they had demanded a cannon that the 
colonists had been given for their own defense and that of the con¬ 
stitution, and had threatened to use force in case it was refused; that 
Castaneda was acting under orders from Santa Anna, an enemy of 
the constitution and laws of the country; and that the Texans were 
determined to fight for this constitution. Castaneda replied that he 
and two-thirds of the Mexicans were republicans, and that he was still 
an officer of the federal government, which, however, had undergone 
considerable change; that, since the majority of the states had decided 
upon the change, Texas, too, must submit to it; that it was not his 
intention to fight the Anglo-Americans; that his instructions were 
simply to demand the cannon, and, if it were refused, to await further 
orders. Colonel Moore then asked that he either surrender with all 
his troops, or join the Texans—in which event he would be allowed 
to retain his rank, pay, and emoluments—or fight immediately. Casta¬ 
neda replied that he must obey orders. Thus the interview ended. 

The Texans again opened fire, and the Mexicans almost imme¬ 
diately threw aside all unnecessary incumbrances, and turned and fled. 
The people who were anxiously awaiting in Gonzales the result of 


THE CAMPAIGN OF 1835 


225 


the skirmish told afterwards that in the early morning the shriek 
of the cannon with its unusual charge could be heard reverberating 
along the valleys with remarkable distinctness. The Mexicans lost 
one man—the total mortality of this memorable engagement. 

Reinforcements continued to arrive at Gonzales, and every one 
seemed anxious that Stephen F. Austin should come thither and direct 
future operations. On October 6 a dispatch was received from Be jar 
saying that Ugartechea was on the way to Gonzales with five hundred 
men. Since requests and demands sent by subordinates had failed to 
bring the cannon, the principal commandant was coming in person 
to “take” it. This only increased the desire for Austin’s presence, and 
when on the same day there were received in Gonzales communica¬ 
tions from Ugartechea addressed to Austin they were forwarded, 
accompanied by the following letter: 

Gonzales, October 6, 1835, twelve o’clock at night. 

Dear Colonel.— You will receive important despatches by the bearer, that 
Colonel Ugartechea and probably General Cos are now on their march here 
with all their forces to take the gun if it is not delivered. 

You will see by Ugartechea’s letter to you he proposes a sort of a compro¬ 
mise. That will give us an opportunity to entertain him a little while, upon 
the suggestion that you are sent for, while we get in more men. We who 
subscribe this request you earnestly to come on immediately, bringing all the 
aid you possibly can. We want powder and lead. Do all you can to send on 
instantly as much as possible. 

P. W. Grayson, 

Pat. C. Jack, 

J. W. Fannin, Jr. 
Thomas P. Gazley, 

J. W. E. Wallace, 

John J. Linn, 

S. R. Miller. 

A. Pollard. 

The volunteers had by this time reached the number of three hun¬ 
dred. Without waiting for Austin’s answer, they held a council of 
war and temporarily organized the troops. Arrangements were made 
to secure as soon as possible supplies such as beeves, wagons, teams, 
spades, shovels, axes, and hoes. A large cornfield was secured from 
Eli Mitchell as a place of encampment. On the same evening, infor¬ 
mation having been received of the advance of the Mexicans upon 
Victoria, one hundred men were despatched thither to help defend 
that place. 

It was generally agreed that the best plan would be to attack 
Be jar and thus to prevent the colony from becoming the battle ground. 
Preparatory to such a campaign, however, a new and permanent 
organization was necessary, and the first step was the election of a 
commander-in-chief. On the morning of October 11, the board of 


226 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


war met and resolved that at four o’clock in the afternoon the elec¬ 
tion should be held by companies. This announcement produced the 
greatest excitement in camp. The men were mostly strangers to each 
other, and those from each section had a candidate to suggest for 
the place. None of the factions seemed willing to submit to the 
choice of any other, and many of the volunteers threatened to return 
to their homes provided their favorites were not elected. Feeling 
ran so high that it seemed for a time that the troops might disband. 

Just at this critical moment, Stephen F. Austin arrived. The effect 
was remarkable. Factional wranglings at once ceased. All parties 
rallied around the general favorite, and he was unanimously chosen 
as commander-in-chief of the army of Texas. 

II. The Capture of Goliad 
By George W. Collinsworth and Ira Ingram 

[The selections which follow are from Barker (ed.), The Austin Papers, 
III, 164, 169, 181. They are printed as written, with spelling, capitalization, and 
punctuation unchanged.] 


a. G. M. Collinsworth to Austin 

Guadaloupe 12 o’Clock October 8 th 1835 

In Camp— 

Col. S. F. Austin : 

Dear Sir I have this day stoped an Express directed to you 
from Martin Perfecto de Cos which I deemed of Some importance 
to our Movements, Consequently have taken the liberty of opening 
the Same, and have Resealed and dispatched with all possible Speed 
—we Shall Enter Laberdee [La Bahia, Goliad] to Night or tomorrow, 
there is from 60 to 100 troops in that place I have under My charge 
47 Good and Effective men which I think all Sufficient to take that 
place, from whence if I have No advice I Shall direct My March to 
Bexar, I also enclose you a letter from the Custom House at Goliad 
to Mr. Dimmet, without a Signature In hast your obt Servant 

Geo. M. Collinsworth, Capt. 

b. James Kerr to Council of War 

Guadaloupe Victoria October 10 th 1835 
11 P. M. 1835 

To the Council of War at Gonzales : 

This moment Col. Milam with an escort of a few men, bringing 
with them 3 officers passing from Goliad arrived here, bound for St 
Felipe—a copy of the following letter will elucidate the matter— 


THE CAMPAIGN OF 1835 


227 


‘‘Goliad 8 oclock A.M. Octr io th 1835 

To Captn Benj. Smith 
Dear Sir : 

I arrived here last night at 11 Oclock and marched into the fort, 
by forcing the Church doors and after a small fight they surrendered 
with 3 officers and 21 soldiers, together with 3 wounded and one killed 
—I had one of my men wounded in the shoulder—They have dis¬ 
patched couriers for Troops to several points and I expect I shall 
need your aid, there is plenty of public horses near here, but I have 
not sufficient forces to send after them, and protect my self. 

Come on as speedily as possible 

Geo. M. Collinsworth. 


c. Report of Arms Captured at Goliad 

The following report and list of armament is returned by the 
undersigned in conformity with an order of the Col. Commanding 
Which is as follows 

6 Saddles—Serviceable, with trifling repairs 

1 Barrell Musket cartridges servesable for close [quarters] 

100—41b Shot— 

44 Lance Heads 1 these two articles will be very usefull 

From 100 to 200 Bayonett J in case of a charge 
200 Stands of Muskets and Carbines—Some of which Might be made 
Serviceable by small repairs but the greater part are broken 
and entirely useless. 

A lot, old broken Cartridge Boxes and Rusty camp kittles all unfit 
for use old Iron etc. etc. 

Ira Ingram Commanding 

Goliad Oct. 13, 1835 
A true Coppy) : 

Statement of arms and munitions of war at Bexar 
500 Muskets j. 

300 Carabines 

2 41b Ps. Artilery with 288 Ball Catridges 192 Grape 

ammunition for these Same complete 

400 Cavilry 
150 Infantry 

500 do Recruits and others 
1050 


228 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


III. The Capture of San Antonio 

By Edward Burleson 

[Colonel Edward Burleson’s report, which follows, is from a copy in John 
Henry Brown, A History of Texas, I, 422-426.] 

Bexar, December 14th, 1835. 

To His Excellency Henry Smith, Provisional Governor of Texas: 

Sir: I have the satisfaction to enclose a copy of Colonel Johnson’s 
account of the storming and surrender of San Antonio de Bexar, to 
which I have little to add that can in any way increase the luster of 
this brilliant achievement to the federal arms of the volunteer army 
under my command; and which will, I trust, prove the downfall of 
the last position of military despotism on our soil of freedom. 

At three o’clock on the morning of the 5th instant, Colonel Neill, 
with a piece of artillery, protected by Captain Roberts and his com¬ 
pany, was sent across the river to attack, at five o’clock, the Alamo, 
on the north side, to draw the attention of the enemy from the advance 
of the division which had to attack the suburbs of the town, under 
Colonels Milam and Johnson. This service was effected to my entire 
satisfaction; and the party returned to camp at nine o’clock a.m. 

On the advance of the attacking division, I formed all the reserve, 
with the exception of the guard necessary to protect the camp, at the 
old mill position, and held myself in readiness to advance, in case 
of necessity, to assist when required; and shortly afterwards passed 
into the suburbs to reconnoitre, where I found all going on prosper¬ 
ously, and retired with the reserve to the camp. Several parties were 
sent out mounted, under Captains Cheshire, Coleman and Roberts, 
to scour the country and endeavor to intercept Ugartechea, who was 
expected, and ultimately forced an entry, with re-inforcements for 
General Cos. Captains Cheshire, Sutherland and Lewis, with their 
companies were sent in as re-inforcements to Colonel Johnson, dur¬ 
ing the period of attack; and Captains Splane, Ruth, and Lieutenant 
Borden with their companies, together with Lieutenant-Colonels 
Somervell and Sublett were kept in readiness as further assistance 
if required. On the evening of the 8th, a party from the Alamo of 
about fifty men, passed up in front of our camp and opened a brisk 
fire, but without effect. They were soon obliged to retire precipitately, 
by opening a six-pounder upon them, commanded by Captain Cum¬ 
mings, by sending a party across the river and by the advance of 
Captain Bradley’s company, who were stationed above. On the morn¬ 
ing of the 9th in consequence of advice from Colonel Johnson of a 
flag of truce having been sent in, to intimate a desire to capitulate, 


THE CAMPAIGN OF 1835 


229 


I proceeded to town, and by two o’clock a. m. of the ioth, a treaty 
was finally concluded by the commissioners appointed, to which I 
acceded immediately, deeming the terms highly favorable, considering 
the strong position and large force of the enemy, which could not be 
less than thirteen hundred effective men; one thousand one hundred 
and five having left this morning with General Cos, besides three com¬ 
panies and several small parties which separated from him in conse¬ 
quence of the fourth article of the treaty. 

In addition to a copy of the treaty I enclose a list of all the valu¬ 
able property ceded to us by virtue of this capitulation. 

General Cos left this morning for the mission of San Jose, and, 
to-morrow, commences his march to the Rio Grande, after complying 
with all that had been stipulated. 

I cannot conclude this despatch without expressing in the warmest 
terms, my entire approbation of every officer and soldier in the army, 
and particularly those who so gallantly volunteered to storm the town, 
which I have the honor to command, and to say that their bravery and 
zeal on the present occasion, merit the warmest eulogies which I can 
confer, and the gratitude of their country. The gallant leader of the 
storming party, Colonel Ben. R. Milam, fell gloriously on the third 
day and his memory will be dear to Texas as long as there exists 
a grateful heart to feel, or a friend of liberty to lament, his loss. 
His place was most ably filled by Colonel F. W. Johnson, adjutant- 
general of the army, whose coolness and prudence, united to daring 
bravery, could alone have brought matters to so successful an issue 
with so very small a loss against so superior a force and such strong 
fortifications. To his shining merits on this occasion, I bore ocular 
testimony during the five days’ action. 

I have also to contribute my praise to Major Bennett, quarter¬ 
master-general, for the diligence and success with which he supplied 
both armies during the siege and storm. 

These despatches with a list of killed and wounded will be handed 
to your Excellency by my first aid-de-camp, Colonel William T. Aus¬ 
tin, who was present as a volunteer, during the five days’ storm, and 
whose conduct on this and every other occasion, merits my warmest 
praise. 

To-morrow I leave the garrison and town under command of 
Colonel Johnson, with a sufficient number of men and officers to sus¬ 
tain the same, in case of attack, until assisted from the colonies; so 
that your Excellency may consider our conquest as sufficiently secured 
against every attempt of the enemy. The rest of the army will retire 
to their homes. 

I have the honor to be, 

Your Excellency’s obedient servant, 

Edward Burleson, 

Commander in Chief of the Volunteer Army. 


230 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Capitulation Entered into by Gen. Martin Perfecto De 
Cos , of the Mexican Troops , and General Edward 
Burleson, of the Colonial Troops of Texas 

Being desirous of preventing the further effusion of blood and the 
ravages of civil war, we have agreed on the following stipula¬ 
tions : 

ist. That General Cos and his officers retire with their arms and 
private property, into the interior of the republic, under parole of 
honor; that they will not in any way oppose the reestablishment of 
the Federal Constitution of 1824. 

2nd. That the one hundred infantry lately arrived with the con¬ 
victs, the remnant of the batallion of Morelos, and the cavalry, retire 
with the General; taking their arms and ten rounds of cartridges for 
their muskets. 

3rd. That the General take the convicts brought in by Colonel 
Ugartechea, beyond the Rio Grande. 

4th. That it is discretionary with the troops to follow their Gen¬ 
eral, remain, or go to such point as they may deem proper; but in 
case they should all or any of them separate they are to have their 
arms, etc. 

5th. That all the public property, money, arms, and munitions 
of war be inventoried and delivered to General Burleson. 

6th. That all private property be restored to its proper owners. 

7th. That three officers of each army be appointed to make out 
the inventory and see that the terms of the capitulation be carried 
into effect. 

8th. That three officers on the part of General Cos remain for 
the purpose of delivering over the said property, stores, etc. 

9th. That General Cos, with his force, for the present occupy 
the Alamo; and General Burleson, with his force, occupy the town 
of Bexar; and that the soldiers of neither party pass to the other 
armed. 

10th. General Cos shall, within six days of the date hereof, re¬ 
move his force from the garrison he now occupies. 

nth. In addition to the arms before mentioned, General Cos 
shall be permitted to take with his force a four-pounder, and ten 
rounds of powder and ball. 

12th. The officers appointed to make the inventory and delivery 
of the stores, etc., shall enter upon the duties to which they have been 
appointed, forthwith. 

13th. The citizens shall be protected in their persons and property. 

14th. General Burleson shall furnish General Cos with such pro¬ 
visions as can be obtained, necessary for his troops to the Rio Grande, 
at the ordinary price of the country. 


THE CAMPAIGN OF 1835 


231 


15th. The sick and wounded of General Cos’s army together with 
a surgeon are permitted to remain. 

16th. No person, either citizen or soldier, to be molested on ac¬ 
count of political opinions hitherto expressed. 

17th. That duplicates of this capitulation be made out in Cas¬ 
tilian and English and signed by the commissioners appointed, and 
ratified by the commanders of both armies. 

18th. The prisoners of both armies, up to this day, shall be put 
at liberty. 

The commissioners, Jose Juan Sanchez, adjutant inspector; Don 
Ramon Musquiz and Lieutenant Francisco Rada, and Interpreter Don 
Miguel Arciniega, appointed by the Commandant and Inspector-Gen¬ 
eral Martin Perfecto de Cos, in connection with Colonel F. W. John¬ 
son, Major R. C. Morris, and Captain J. G. Swisher, and Interpreter 
John Cameron, appointed on the part of General Edward Burleson, 
after a long and serious discussion, adopted the eighteen preceding 
articles, reserving their ratification by the Generals of both armies. 

In virtue of which, we have signed this instrument in the city of 
Bexar on the nth of December, 1835. 

Jose Juan Sanchez, 

Ramon Musquiz, 

J. Francisco de Rada, 

Miguel Arciniega, Interpreter, 

F. W. Johnson, 

Robert C. Morris, 

James G. Swisher, 

John Cameron, Interpreter. 

I consent to and will observe the above articles. 


Martin Perfecto de Cos. 

Ratified and approved. 

Edward Burleson. 

Commander-In-Chief of the Volunteer Army. 

A true copy. 

Edward Burleson, Commander-in-Chief. 


IV. Address of the General Council to the Captors 
of San Antonio 


[From the lournal of the Proceedings of the General Council, etc., 161-162 
(Houston, 1839).] 

Council Hall, San Felipe de Austin, 
December 15, 1835. 


232 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


To General Edward Burleson, Colonel F. Johnson and all the brave 
officers and soldiers of the citizen volunteer army in Bexar. 

Fellow-Citizens : 

The Representatives of your General Council, were this hour 
greeted with the welcome intelligence of your glorious victory and 
triumphant conquest, over the post of Bexar, with all your enemies 
prisoners, together with all the arms, munitions and provisions. We 
expected no less from our heroic citizens, and brave compatriots of 
our northern brethren. We felt that you were invincible, and that 
our enemies, although greatly out-numbering you, must yield to the 
sons of freedom. Their cause is that of oppression and tyranny, ours, 
that of liberty and equal rights. They are but the hireling slaves of 
an usurper. You are the brave sons of Washington and freedom, and 
you have proved yourselves worthy of your glorious origin. You have 
fulfilled the expectations of your country, and the hopes of all the 
lovers of liberty on earth. Your Representatives extend to you the 
cordial hand of congratulation and gratitude as well in behalf of our 
fellow-citizens and our families, as for themselves. You have val¬ 
iantly acquitted yourselves of the high trust which your country’s dan¬ 
ger caused you to assume, and your names will be enrolled in the 
first pages of your country’s history of heroes, as well as imprinted 
on the hearts of your fellow-citizens. But in the midst of joy there 
is mourning, and while we shout your victory, the tears of holy sor¬ 
row bedew our faces. The brave and heroic Milam has fallen in 
the arms of victory; and the cause of his injured country. In him 
we have lost a precious gem from the casket of brilliant heroes. God 
rest his soul! while his memory shall survive as long as a freeman 
has a standing in Texas. 

Other brave men have also mingled their blood with their coun¬ 
try’s sacrifices. Their honor is imperishable. That your first noble 
example may be followed is the ardent wish of your Representatives, 
whose efforts in their sphere have been anxiously directed for your 
aid and comfort; and had your country’s means at command been 
equal to her generous gratitude, your every want had been promptly 
supplied. 

Citizen Soldiers: Many of you have long been in the field of 
honor and of danger, separated from your families and your homes. 
A respite from your labors and your privations must be desirable; 
and it is reasonable, in anticipation of this glorious event to be achieved 
by your arms. Your government has been solicitously engaged in 
organizing a regular army, upon a proper footing, together with pro¬ 
visions for an auxiliary volunteer corps, that you might be released 
and get rest among your families and friends, until the future calls 
of your country again place you in defence of her, and your just 


THE CAMPAIGN OF 1835 


233 


rights. To such calls you have always proved your hearty response. 
We address you in much haste, but with feelings not to be repressed. 
Your joy is our joy, your sorrows our sorrows; and with assurance 
of unabating sympathies with you, and all our fellow-citizens in the 
present glorious epoch in our country’s annals. 

We are truly your 

FELLOW CITIZENS AND FRIENDS. 


CHAPTER XXII 


THE TEXAS DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 

I. The Drafting of the Declaration 
By James K. Greer 

[The selection which follows is from an article entitled, “The Committee on 
the Texas Declaration of Independence,” in The Southzvestern Historical Quar¬ 
terly, XXX, 239-251, XXXI, 33-49, 130-149. The part of the article not repro¬ 
duced here contains biographical studies of the members of the committee 
which framed the declaration.] 

The winter of 1835-36 saw public opinion in Texas crystallize 
toward the belief that the time had arrived for Texas to sever its 
relation with the Mexican government. Hope that the Mexican Lib¬ 
erals would assist the Texans in a future safe-guarding of their rights 
had dwindled; a declaration on November 7, 1835, favor of the 
Mexican constitution of 1824 had repelled Americans and failed to 
secure support from Mexico. Even Stephen F. Austin, the colonist 
most loyal to the Mexican government in Texas, who had said in 
November, 1835, that Texas had “legal and equitable and just grounds 
to declare independence>” but continued to insist on strict adherence 
to the Mexican Federal Union during the same period, finally said 
that he was now in favor of an immediate declaration of independence. 
Having arrived at this conclusion, Austin now threw all his influence, 
and it was of great weight with the people as a whole, to securing 
unity of the people in favor of a declaration of separation from the 
Mexican government. Austin, along with a majority of intelligent 
observers, saw that Texan independence was inevitable, and proceeded 
to prepare the people for the coming struggle. Without reviewing 
the movement for independence and the manner in which a large pro¬ 
portion of the Texans had arrived at the point of looking forward 
to it, the adoption of the declaration of independence and the lives of 
the committeemen who reported that instrument are herein consid¬ 
ered. The provisional government authorized the holding of this, the 
fourth convention of the colonists, whose delegates were invested with 
plenary powers. The convention was to assemble on March 1st. 

On February 1, an election of delegates to the convention was held 
in the various municipalities. Sixty-two delegates were elected to the 
convention and fifty-nine were present to take part in the proceedings. 

234 


THE TEXAS DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 235 


Three delegates, James Kerr, J. J. Linn, and Juan Antonio Padilla 
arrived too late to participate in the convention. According to Colonel 
W. F. Gray, 1 an eye-witness at the convention, when the delegates 
assembled on the cold morning of March i, forty-one members were 
present who had been duly elected as delegates and others were soon 
to arrive. The convention was called to order by George C. Childress 
of Milam. James W. Collingsworth of Victoria, and W. A. Farris 
were then made chairman and secretary, pro-tem, respectively. The 
working organization was then completed, with Richard Ellis having 
been elected chairman, H. S. Kimble, secretary, and other regular 
officers were installed. The chairman appointed Childress and S. H. 
Everett to act as tellers. 

Early in this session Childress introduced the following resolution: 
'‘Resolved that the President appoint a committee to consist of five 
delegates to draft a Declaration of Independence.” Martin Parmer, 
of the municipality of Tenaha, offered an amendment to this resolu¬ 
tion which provided for the appointment of a delegate from each 
municipality to serve on the proposed committee. The amendment 
was defeated and the resolution passed. President Ellis appointed 
George C. Childress of Milam, James Gaines of Sabine, Edward Conrad 
of Refugio, Collin McKinney of Red river, and Bailey Hardeman of 
Matagorda to report a declaration of independence. Of the five men, 
Conrad, Hardeman, Gaines, McKinney, and Childress, two, Hardeman 
and Childress, were lawyers and skilled at legal phraseology. Two, 
Gaines and McKinney, were advanced in years, McKinney being sev¬ 
enty, and tutored by mankind’s best teacher, Life. These last two 
men had lived in several states, and their experience, conservatism, 
and practical judgment were not unvalued in a matter of this nature. 
Conrad seems to have been a bit impetuous, but because of early 
opportunities, was in all probability a well informed man. 

Evidence of the early interest of Childress, Conrad, and Gaines 
in a desire for an adequate government, may be easily produced. 
Before emigrating to Texas, and while connected with The Banner 
and Advertiser of Nashville, Tennessee, Childress undoubtedly used 
his position and opportunity to further the interests of his friends in 
the province of Texas. Such action would have been only natural 

1 Colonel Gray, one of thousands who were hard hit by the depression of 
1833, came to Texas to investigate the land situation. He was employed to 
act as agent by two friends of Washington, D. C., who were interested in land 
possibilities in Texas and Louisiana. In a diary, he carefully and apparently 
scrupulously narrates his observations. He made two trips to Texas; one in 
1835-36, and the second in 1837. For what he observed, his Diary must be 
acknowledged a good source. 

It is interesting to notice that Gray was confirmed by the Senate of the 
Republic to be a Notary Public of Houston, January, 1839- In 1840 he was 
confirmed as District Attorney of the First Judicial District. See E. W. 
Winkler, Secret Journals of the-Senate of the Republic of Texas, 1836-1845 
(Austin, 1911), 129, 188. 


236 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


because of the numerous settlers in Texas from Tennessee, the early 
activities of the Nashville Company, and Sterling Robertson’s work 
as an empresario from that state. 

On November 17, 1835, the press of Nashville published a call for 
a public meeting of the citizens of Nashville and Davidson County, 
to be held at the courthouse, “for the purpose of adopting suitable 
measures for the assistance of their fellow-citizens, in the province of 
Texas.” At this meeting Childress was unanimously called to the 
chair, and William K. Hill was then appointed secretary. As chair¬ 
man, Childress explained the object of the meeting and “eloquently 
portrayed the condition of our friends and countrymen, who are there 
battling for all that freemen hold most dear, against the grasping 
ambitions of Mexico’s despot and his hireling slaves.” . . . 

Following the chairman’s address, resolutions were submitted and 
unanimously adopted, pledging sympathy and support. Brief addresses 
were then delivered, after which liberal contributions were made by 
several individuals, and volunteers were pledged. The meeting was 
described as the most spirited ever held in Nashville. 

This public meeting was followed by other meetings. One indi¬ 
vidual was said to have donated five thousand dollars to the cause, 
and to have appointed “Geo. C. Childress, Esq., his agent to tender 
it to the acting public authorities in Texas.” Childress had been 
designated also by resolution in the meeting of November 17, as cor¬ 
respondent from Texas with the committee of five men in Nashville. 2 

One writer has stated that Conrad was zealous for independence 
from the Mexican government and looked to the organized govern¬ 
ment of the state for action in behalf of independence. Conrad is 
quoted as having written to Ira Ingram, secretary of the Goliad con¬ 
vention, which met December 20, 1835, as follows: 

1 am not in accord with the spirit of procrastination which holds in its 
grasp many of our people. But I have faith in their sincerity, but little in their 
judgment. I am looking to the organized government for a more determined 
stand for independence. If this is long delayed, our cherished hopes will be 
blasted and we will become the vassals of the most repugnant government 
history has known. 

Such advocacy is not surprising, however, when it is recalled that 
many of the leading men, for some months, had been openly using 
their best efforts to further the feeling that the time for a separation 
of Texas from Mexico had arrived. 

2 Sterling C. Robertson returned to Nashville from his colony in September, 
1835, and in discussing the situation in Texas stated that “it must, before long, 
come under the government of the United States and be independent, as the 
present state of affairs cannot last long.” See The Arkansas Gazette, Little 
Rock, October 20, 1825. He was advertising for colonists in the local papers. 
It is likely that his nephew, Childress, returned with him. They served in the 
Convention, a few weeks later, as delegates from Milam. 


THE TEXAS DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 237 


Gaines’s position on independence is shown by Colonel W. F. Gray, 
who, en route to Texas, arrived at Gaines’s Ferry, and recorded the 
experience thus: 

Thursday, January 28, 1836. . . . After a pleasant ride (bating muddy 
roads), arrived at dusk on the banks of the Sabine, at Gaines’ Ferry. . . . 
The ferry and tavern are owned and kept by Capt. Jas. Gaines, who emigrated 
nearly thirty years ago from Culpeper, Va. He has seen much of Texas and 
appears to be well versed in its history; is much of a politician, and a candi¬ 
date for the new Convention, the election for which takes place next Monday. 

Gaines says he fixed himself at this place in - believing that Texas 

belonged to the United States, Mr. Adams having proved that it did, and he 
still hopes that it will. He goes for the independence of Texas, and then, to 
unite with Uncle Sam, if he will. 


If McKinney and Hardeman had not previously voiced their posi¬ 
tion on the question of independence, their action in the convention, 
upon the introduction of that instrument, indicates that the committee 
was unanimous in its report. At least, as we shall see, if President 
Ellis attempted to have the former factions of this topic of the day 
—“pro and con”—represented on the committee, the “con” did not 
manifest itself. 

It is unfortunate that facts concerning the sitting of the committee 
and the drafting of the declaration have not been ascertained. How¬ 
ever, authorities that have referred to the authorship of the declara¬ 
tion have ascribed that honor to the credit of the chairman, George 
'C. Childress. It may be said with some certainty that Childress was 
the one of the committee best fitted for the phrasing of the docu¬ 
ment. McKinney’s schooling had been limited to six months when a 
mere boy—an experience common to many outstanding men of that 
day and since. Gaines, too, as clearly indicated by his letters, had 
been educated only in the “school of experience.” There is no avail¬ 
able evidence that Conrad was qualified for such a task, although he 
possessed more than average training as evidenced later by his 
assignment to duty as an army enlistment officer, and his resolution 
in the convention. 

Bailey Hardeman possessed legal training, but he had been out of 
touch with affairs of state while with the military and may be con¬ 
sidered as not having been endowed with the initiative required to 
prosecute such an effort. 

Childress, as has been stated, had been trained in law, and was 
experienced in writing as an attorney and newspaper editor. His 
addresses in Tennessee in behalf of Texas are a fair index to his 
ability with the pen. Certainly, his ability as an extemporaneous 
speaker was unusual, and his association before the bar at Nashville 
was with such men as enriched his experience in statesmanship. His 
letters were good evidence of his command of form and of his ability 
to express his ideas. Writing was, he once modestly admitted in a 



READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


238 

0 \ A) i 

letter to President Lamar, not a task for him. He said, “I write 
mechanically, with dispatch, and have been somewhat in the practice 
of composition.” 

W. P. Zuber, a contemporary who visited the convention on March 
io, refers to Childress as the author of the declaration. E. M. Pease, 
who was asked to serve as assistant secretary of the convention, has 
been quoted as saying: “It is generally understood that Mr. Childress 
brought the draft of the Declaration of Independence with him to the 
convention and that it was submitted to and received the approval of 
several leaders of the convention. There is little doubt, but that this 
is correct, because very soon after the committee met it was rumored 
that a declaration of independence had been agreed upon.” Whether 
Mr. Pease voiced such a statement or not does not detract from the 
probability and likelihood of such being a fact. 

According to Mrs. Cone Johnson of Tyler, Texas, whose father, 
Colonel Elijah Sterling Clark Robertson, was a cousin of Childress, 
family tradition says that “he wrote it, phrased it, and penned it.” 
Colonel Robertson came to Texas in 1831, and figured actively in the 
affairs of the Republic. Mrs. Johnson has stated that her father 
always said: “Geo. C. Childress, Chairman, wrote the Declaration 
with his own pen, without assistance; and he, my father, always spoke 
with pride of his ability and brilliancy, though only a young man.” 
True, such data may be open to classification and criticism as “tradi¬ 
tion” by the trained student, but one must admit that it is rather well 
borne out by the contemporary evidence that is to be had. 

The editorial columns of The Telegraph and Texas Register of 
March 12, 1836, refer to Childress as “the Chairman of the Committee 
who drafted the instrument.” 

That Childress’ ability as a statesman and his acquaintance with 
the declaration of independence were recognized is shown by his 
appointment as Texas Diplomatic Agent to Washington by President 
Burnet. Among the first duties following the presentation of his 
credentials at Washington was to submit a copy of the declaration of 
independence to the United States authorities. 

The “Proceedings of the Convention at Washington,” as preserved 
by the secretary, give no better account of the report of the committee 
on the declaration than that kept by Colonel Gray in his Diary: 

Wednesday, March 2, 1836. 

The Convention met pursuant to adjournment. Mr. Childress, from the 
Committee, reported a Declaration of Independence, which he read in his place. 
It was received by the house, committed to a commitstee of the whole, re¬ 
ported without amendment, and unanimously adopted, in less than one hour 
from its first and only reading. It underwent no discipline, and no attempt 
was made to amend it. The only speech made upon it was a somewhat 
declamatory address in Committee of the Whole by General Houston. 

Assistant clerks were appointed, and, there being no printing press at Wash¬ 
ington, various copies of the Declaration were ordered to be made and sent 


THE TEXAS DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 239 


by express to various points and to the United States for publication: 1.000 

copies ordered to be printed at - for circulation. . . 

A copy of the Declaration having been made in a fair hand, an attempt 
was made to read it, preparatory to signing it, but it was found so full of 
errors that it was recommitted to the Committee that reported it for correction 
and engrossment. . . . 


The entries of Gray’s Diary compare uniformly with the Journal of 
the Convention on the proceedings of that body, and seem to be the 
one source ascertainable on the activities of the house when the Decla¬ 
ration was reported. A perusal of Colonel Gray’s report convinces 
one that he was a keen and interested observer throughout the assembly 
and that he was absolutely unbiased in his entries until the latter 
part of the convention. It seems reasonable to conclude that he cer¬ 
tainly wanted to see a smoothly functioning government organized 
in order that he might learn the possibility of securing some land in 
accordance with his mission. His only really impatient entry was not 
recorded until a month after the convention adjourned. At this time 
the tone was no doubt influenced by keen and natural disappointment 
over the disposition of the land question. Nevertheless, the Diary 
continues uniformly accurate as far as can be ascertained by com¬ 
parisons. 

On motion of Goodrich of the municipality of Washington, a copy 
of the declaration was to be sent to Bexar, Goliad, Nacogdoches, 
Brazoria, San Felipe, and Natchitoches, and “the printer at San Felipe 
requested to print in handbill form, for distribution, one thousand 
copies and that a committee of three be appointed to carry the above 
resolution into effect.” Messrs. Goodrich, Parmer, and Byron were 
appointed as the committee. 

On March 3 , additional delegates, late in arriving, took their seats, 
and contested elections of others were decided. The engrossed decla¬ 
ration was read and then signed by all the members present . 3 Accord- 

3 According to W. P. Zuber, in an article in the Galveston News of June 
24, 1900, the original declaration was carried by Kimble, the secretary, to his 
home in Kentucky. Kimble was not a delegate to the convention. Thus, says 
Zuber, the original Declaration was lost to the Texans and never recovered. 

Seth Shepherd is quoted under a Beaumont, Texas, date-line, in the Gal¬ 
veston News of April 5, 1905, with a different story. He states that the 
original Declaration was discovered in the United States Archives, and that 
it was returned to Texas through Senator Culberson, by co-operative kindness 
of the Secretary of State of the United States. This original was labeled:— 
“left at the Archives by Wharton, May 28, 1836,” and was marked “Original." 

If the second acount is true, then the natural question arises, who gave the 
original to Wharton? How did he secure it? Certainly, mention of such, if 
done, by the Texas government, is lacking in the correspondence records. The 
Commission of which he was a member heard from their Government only 
once. Did Childress give it to him? Hardly so, because Carson does not so 
describe this instrument as a part of Childress’ credentials. Evidently the 
engrossed “original" is meant. The matter has not been clarified. Both 
accounts are probably right, as far as they go. The Department of State, 



240 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


mg to Colonel Gray, Roberts, and Taylor, of the municipality of 
Nacogdoches, “at first expressed some difficulty about signing, but 
finally yielded and added their names.” It is to be regretted that no 
information is available concerning the hesitancy of these men. Copies 
of the declaration were then “dispatched by express in various direc¬ 
tions.” 4 All delegates present signed, and those that entered later 
were allowed to sign as they came in. 

As the proceedings of the convention continued, the individuals 
of the committee on the declaration participated to an appreciable 
extent. Conrad was identified with various measures dealt with in 
the convention, although he was more concerned with the matter of 
lands than with the political theorizing that occurred. He introduced 
three very important and lengthy resolutions dealing with two out¬ 
standing subjects: the question of land grants and land bounties, and 
the organization of the military affairs. His first resolution, intro¬ 
duced on March 3, 1836, provided for the closing of the land offices 
granting land while soldiers in the field with claims equal to those 
receiving land were unable to secure grants. To supplement this reso¬ 
lution, on March 8, he moved that three land commissioners be ap¬ 
pointed to investigate land conditions in the state, in general; that 
the land records be secured and safely retained by the commissioners. 

On the 10th, Conrad’s motion to have the convention resolve itself 
into a committee of the whole, and to consider the report concerning 
the organization of “the physical force of the country” carried, and 
favorable action upon the report was promptly taken. And on the 
same day, having secured the passage of a motion dispensing with 
the “day on the table rule,” he obtained an act which furnished the 
medical department of the army with information as to the manner of 
securing surgeons and a surgeon general. 

Probably Conrad’s resolution concerning bounty lands for the army 
volunteers was his most flattering effort. That the resolution was 
well put and slated for passage, is indicated by the Diary of Colonel 
Gray: 

Monday, March 14, 1836. 

. . . Conrad today introduced a series of resolutions, giving large land 
bounties to the volunteers ... It will doubtless succeed in some shape, for the 
military interest has great ascendancy in this body. It is necessary to con¬ 
ciliate the military, and scarcely anything that they can ask will be refused. 
They know the country will have to be defended by volunteers from the United 
States, and they therefore will bid high for them. 

The resolution was read, amended, and adopted on March 17. 

Austin, does have the recovered “original” that Shepherd speaks of. This 
Declaration is what might be termed the engrossed and signed copy. Zuber’s 
“original” was probably in Childress’ handwriting. 

This opinion is influenced by Gammel, Laws of Texas, I, 837, 883, 903. 

4 For the reception of the Declaration of Independence in the United States, 
see articles in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XVI, 270-277, and XVII, 
262, by James E. Winston. 



THE TEXAS DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 241 


Hardeman did not take a very active part in the convention, but 
his motions indicated a desire to see a constitution reported and acted 
upon as promptly as possible. On March 8, 1836, he moved that 
“all subjects not directly connected with the constitution of this re¬ 
public lay on the table until that instrument be adopted by this con¬ 
vention.” The motion was laid on the table, but when he called for 
it on the 10th, the house sustained the call, and the motion which 
was amended to read . . . “unless taken up by two-thirds of the 
house, without debate,” was passed. 

He was appointed on two committees: to organize the militia, and 
to consider Colonel Morgan’s payment of tariff duties levied by the 
provisional government. 

McKinney was among the silent members of the convention. A 
man of action—a practical man, he apparently made no speeches, but 
was active enough in the common cause before and after the conven¬ 
tion. However, he served on one very important committee; the 
committee to frame the constitution. He with Hardeman, Gaines, 
and eighteen others composed the committee. 

Gaines was not very active in the convention proceedings, and one 
does not find in the Journal much that reflects the political doctrine 
of this practical and astute politician. However, he served as chair¬ 
man of one committee, and also made one motion. As chairman of 
the committee on the disposition of Mexican prisoners, he made a 
detailed report concerning their treatment. He served on a standing 
military committee, and on a committee “to correct errors and 
phraseology relating to the present provisions” of the constitution. 
His motion, made on March 10, was to reconsider the resolution 
which had commissioned two men, Black and Burnett, to raise a 
company of volunteers and disperse Indians, supposed to be near the 
San Antonio road. 

Childress participated extensively in the proceedings of the con¬ 
vention, but his general view of government can be only inferred 
from his motions and brief debates, indicated in the Journal. Although 
verbose, he seems to have been a man of clearcut ideas, bulwarked 
by legal training and practice. Early in the convention (March 3), 
when Collinsworth moved that all papers and documents that were 
transferred to the convention “be referred to a committee of five 
delegates for examination and report,” Childress was appointed one 
of the committee. On the following day he remarked on the advan¬ 
tages of avoiding dissensions and irritating questions which might 
arise in the course of the deliberations. 

One illustration of Childress’ practicality, evinced early in the 
convention, may be cited here. When the report reached the conven¬ 
tion that the Alamo was in danger of being taken, one delegate moved 
that the convention hasten to the scene of action and there in camp 
complete the organization of the government, Childress vigorously 
opposed this plan. Assisted by Rusk and Collinsworth, Childress so 


242 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


effectively argued against the motion to adjourn that it was easily 
decided in the negative. 

Some of Childress’ more important motions were: The prevention 
of slave trade in the Republic, not to be construed as opposition to 
bringing of slaves into the state by immigrants; that 1,000 copies of 
this report be printed; that “no person shall ever be imprisoned for 
debt, on any pretense whatever”; that the loan made by the agents of 
the Republic in New Orleans be explained; and, finally, on March 
17, to adjourn sine die. 

Other motions of Childress’ were: that “a single star of five 
points, either of gold or silver, be adopted as the peculiar emblem 
of this republic”; that “every officer and soldier of the army and 
members of this convention, and all friends of Texas, be requested to 
wear it on their hats or bosoms” ; that the letter from Mr. G. B. Franks, 
regarding the Indians around Milam, be referred to the committee on 
military affairs; and various motions to act upon reports of com¬ 
mittees. He served on several committees: the committee on creden¬ 
tials of delegates; to report on the papers of John M. Smith; to 
inspect the enrollment of the ordinance bills; as a member of the 
standing committee of finance; to draft a provision for the constitu¬ 
tion on the subject of lands, and to “draw copies of the act organ¬ 
izing the militia.” 

Following Childress’ motion to adjourn sine die the delegates dis¬ 
persed in all directions in great haste. “Their families are exposed 
and defenseless, and thousands are moving off to the east,” recorded 
Colonel Gray in his Diary, before he joined the people leaving 
Washington. 


II. The Declaration 

The Unanimous Declaration of Independence made by the Delegates 
of the People of Texas in General Convention at the Town of 
Washington on the 2nd Day of March 1836 

When a government has ceased to protect the lives, liberty and 
property of the people, from whom its legitimate powers are derived, 
and for the advancement of whose happiness it was instituted, and, 
so far from being a guarantee for the enjoyment of those inestimable 
and inalienable rights, becomes an instrument in the hands of evil 
rulers for their oppression: When the Federal Republican Constitu¬ 
tion of their country, which they have sworn to support, no longer 
has a substantial existence, and the whole nature of their government 
has been forcibly changed, without their consent, from a restricted 
federative republic, composed of sovereign states, to a consolidated, 
central, military despotism in which every interest is disregarded but 
that of the army and the priesthood—both the eternal enemies of civil 


THE TEXAS DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 243 


liberty, the ever-ready minions of power, and the usual instruments 
of tyrants. When, long after the spirit of the constitution has de¬ 
parted, moderation is, at length, so far lost by those in power that 
even the semblance of freedom is removed, and the forms themselves, 
of the constitution discontinued; and so far from their petitions and 
remonstrances being regarded the agents who bear them are thrown 
into dungeons; and mercenary armies sent forth to force a new gov¬ 
ernment upon them at the point of the bayonet: When in consequence 
of such acts of malfeasance and abdication, on the part of the gov¬ 
ernment, anarchy prevails, and civil society is dissolved into its original 
elements—In such a crisis, the first law of nature, the right of self- 
preservation—the inherent and inalienable right of the people to appeal 
to first principles and take their political affairs into their own hands 
in extreme cases—enjoins it as a right towards themselves and a sacred 
obligation to their posterity to abolish such government and create 
another, in its stead, calculated to rescue them from impending dangers, 
and to secure their future welfare and happiness. 

Nations, as well as individuals, are amenable for their acts to the 
public opinion of mankind. A statement of a part of our grievances 
is, therefore, submitted to an impartial world, in justification of the 
hazardous but unavoidable step now taken of severing our political 
connection with the Mexican people, and assuming an independent 
attitude among the nations of the earth. 

The Mexican government, by its colonization laws, invited and 
induced the Anglo-American population of Texas to colonize its wilder¬ 
ness under the pledged faith of a written constitution that they should 
continue to enjoy that constitutional liberty and republican government 
to which they had been habituated in the land of their birth, the 
United States of America. In this expectation they have been cruelly 
disappointed, inasmuch as the Mexican nation has acquiesced in the 
late changes made in the government by General Antonio Lopez de 
Santa Anna, who, having overturned the constitution of his country, 
now offers us the cruel alternative either to abandon our homes, ac¬ 
quired by so many privations, or submit to the most intolerable of 
all tyranny, the combined despotism of the sword and the priesthood. 

It has sacrificed our welfare to the state of Coahuila, by which 
our interests have been continually depressed through a jealous and 
partial course of legislation carried on at a far distant seat of gov¬ 
ernment, by a hostile majority, in an unknown tongue; and this too, 
notwithstanding we have petitioned in the humblest terms, for the 
establishment of a separate state government, and have, in accordance 
with the provisions of the national constitution, presented to the gen¬ 
eral Congress a republican constitution which was, without just cause, 
contemptuously rejected. 

It incarcerated in a dungeon, for a long time, one of our citizens, 
for no other cause but a zealous endeavor to procure the acceptance 
of our constitution and the establishment of a state government. 


244 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


It has failed and refused to secure on a firm basis, the right of 
trial by jury, that palladium of civil liberty, and only safe guarantee 
for the life, liberty, and property of the citizen. 

It has failed to establish any public system of education, although 
possessed of almost boundless resources (the public domain) and, 
although it is an axiom, in political science, that unless a people are 
educated and enlightened it is idle to expect the continuance of civil 
liberty, or the capacity for self-government. 

It has suffered the military commandants stationed among us to 
exercise arbitrary acts of oppression and tyranny; thus trampling upon 
the most sacred rights of the citizen and rendering the military 
superior to the civil power. 

It has dissolved by force of arms, the State Congress of Coahuila 
and Texas, and obliged our representatives to fly for their lives from 
the seat of government; thus depriving us of the fundamental political 
right of representation. 

It has demanded the surrender of a number of our citizens, and 
ordered military detachments to seize and carry them into the interior 
for trial; in contempt of the civil authorities, and in defiance of the 
laws and the constitution. 

It has made piratical attacks upon our commerce, by commissioning 
foreign desperadoes, and authorizing them to seize our vessels, and 
convey the property of our citizens to far distant ports for confiscation. 

It denies us the right of worshipping the Almighty according to 
the dictates of our own conscience; by the support of a national re¬ 
ligion calculated to promote the temporal interests of its human func¬ 
tionaries rather than the glory of the true and living God. 

It has demanded us to deliver up our arms, which are essential to 
our defense, the rightful property of freemen, and formidable only 
to tyrannical governments. 

It has invaded our country, both by sea and by land, with intent 
to lay waste our territory and drive us from our homes; and has now 
a large mercenary army advancing to carry on against us a war of 
extermination. 

It has, through its emisaries, incited the merciless savage, with the 
tomahawk and scalping knife, to massacre the inhabitants of our de¬ 
fenseless frontiers. 

It hath been, during the whole time of our; connection with it, the 
contemptible sport and victim of successive military revolutions; and 
hath continually exhibited every characteristic of a weak, corrupt, and 
tyrannical government. 

These, and other grievances, were patiently borne by the people 
of Texas until they reached that point at which forbearance ceases 
to be a virtue. We then took up arms in defence of the national 
constitution. We appealed to our Mexican brethren for assistance. 
Our appeal has been made in vain. Though months have elapsed, no 
sympathetic response has yet been heard from the Interior. We are, 


THE TEXAS DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 245 


therefore, forced to the melancholy conclusion that the Mexican people 
have acquiesced in the destruction of their liberty, and the substitution 
therefor of a military government—that they are unfit to be free and 
incapable of self-government. 

The necessity of self-preservation, therefore, now decrees our 
eternal political separation. 

We, therefore, the delegates, with plenary powers, of the people 
of Texas, in solemn convention assembled, appealing to a candid world 
for the necessities of our condition, do hereby resolve and declare 
that our political connection with the Mexican nation has forever 
ended; and that the people of Texas do now constitute a free sov¬ 
ereign and independent republic, and are fully invested with all the 
rights and attributes which properly belong to independent nations; 
and, conscious of the rectitude of our intentions, we fearlessly and 
confidently commit the issue to the decision of the Supreme Arbiter 
of the destinies of nations. 


CHAPTER XXIII 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION OF THE REPUBLIC 
OF TEXAS 

By Rupert N. Richardson 

[The complete study of which this is a somewhat abbreviated form is pub¬ 
lished in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XXXI, 191-219. Read also: 
Garrison, Texas, Chapter XVIII; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School 
History of Texas, 108-113; James K. Greer, “The Committee on the Texas 
Declaration of Independence,” in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XXX, 
239-251, XXXI, 33-49, 130-149.] 

The Members and Their Organization 

In the autumn and December of 1835 the Texas colonists revolted 
and cleared the Anglo-American region of Mexican forces. In accord¬ 
ance with an ordinance of the General Council enacted December 11 
and passed over the Governor’s veto December 13, 1835, elections 
were held on the first day of February, 1836, and delegates were 
chosen to represent their respective districts in a plenary convention 
for Texas, which was to convene March 1. The constitution that was 
to be drawn up was not to become operative until ratified by a major¬ 
ity of the voters. 

Pursuant to these plans the Convention assembled at Washington 
on the Brazos and proceeded with the details of organization. The 
purpose of this paper is to present a study of the work of that body 
as it pertained to the forming of a constitution, together with some 
account of the history of that instrument, up to the time it became 
effective as the fundamental law of the Republic of Texas. 

It seems fitting to take some notice in the beginning of the condi¬ 
tions under which this body of legislators labored. The town of 
Washington was a frontier village of a hundred or so inhabitants. 
There was no printing press, no library was available, except for books 
brought in by the delegates, and the conditions under which the mem¬ 
bers were obliged to work would have discouraged men less seasoned 
in frontier life. The house used as a meeting place was an unfur¬ 
nished wooden structure without doors or windows. Cotton cloth in 
lieu of glass helped to keep out the cold wind. On the day the con¬ 
vention was organized a “norther” was blowing and the mercury stood 
at thirty-three degrees. “A long rough table extended from near the 

246 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION 


247 


front door to near the rear wall, and was equidistant from the side 
walls. On this table the public documents and the papers of the 
convention were laid, and the delegates were seated around it, the 
presiding officer sitting at the end and the secretary nearest him on 
his left. There was no bar around this table to prevent intrusion upon 
their deliberations. . . . Spectators entered the chamber at will, but 
they walked gently, so as not to annoy the delegates.” 

But the lack of accommodations represented one of the least dif¬ 
ficulties the assembly had to face. Far more serious was the fact that 
they never knew what day they might be obliged to disband and either 
seek safety in flight or join the army then being assembled to stop the 
Mexican advance. From the very first day they were uneasy about the 
fate of the Texan forces in the vicinities of Goliad and San Antonio, 
and they knew that, even if Travis' little force should be able to 
hold out ai Bexar, Santa Anna had a force sufficiently large to send 
an advance party of cavalry to put them to flight or capture their 
whole company. 

Of the permanent organization Richard Ellis, of Red river, was 
president, and H. S. Kimble, who had recently come from Tennessee, 
was secretary. . . . 

On Wednesday, March 2, a motion made by Robert Potter and 
adopted provided “That a committee be appointed consisting of one 
member from each municipality represented in the convention for the 
purpose of drafting a constitution for Texas, and that the same be 
reported as soon as practicable to this convention.” The president 
immediately appointed as members of this committee Messrs. Martin 
Parmer of San Augustine, Robert Potter of Nacogdoches, Charles B. 
Stewart of Austin, Edwin Waller of Brazoria, Jesse Grimes of Wash¬ 
ington, R. M. Coleman of Mina, John Fisher of Gonzales, J. W. 
Bunton of Mina, James Gaines of Sabine, Lorenzo de Zavala of 
Harrisburg, Stephen H. Everett of Jasper, Bailey Hardeman of Mata¬ 
gorda, Elijah Stapp of Jackson, William C. Crawford of Shelby, 
Claiborne West of Jefferson, James Power of Refugio, Antonio 
Navarro of Bexar, Collin McKinney of Pecan Point, William Menifee 
of Colorado, William Motley of Goliad, and Michael B. Menard. On 
March 2, Messrs. Houston, elected by Refugio, Robert Hamilton of 
Pecan Point, James Collinsworth of Brazoria, and David Thomas of 
Refugio were added to the committee. This list of delegates repre¬ 
sents about half of the convention. Some men who participated 
extensively in discussing and perfecting the constitution were not 
named on the committee. Among those not named should be men¬ 
tioned Samuel P. Carson, Thomas J. Rusk, Edward Conrad, George 
C. Childress, and Richard Ellis, the last president of the convention. 

In this connection it may be well to take some notice of the char¬ 
acteristics, training, and experience of some of the delegates who 
appear to have been most active in the proceedings. Richard Ellis had 
participated in the Alabama Constitutional Convention of 1819, and 


248 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


had come to Texas (or Arkansas, for he lived near the boundary which 
had not been surveyed) in 1825. The people of Miller County, 
Arkansas, elected him as their representative to the Arkansas Consti¬ 
tutional Convention of 1835, but he did not attend because of ill 
health. William Fairfax Gray thought Ellis made a poor presiding 
officer, and charged him with failure to preserve order and with show¬ 
ing partiality to certain members. However, it must have been a 
difficult task to direct the proceedings of an organization of frontier 
statesmen crowded for time and working under the tension that so 
many issues of vital importance naturally produced. 

Probably the delegate best know r n at that time was Sam Houston. 
He was generally looked to as one of the few men whose experience 
and attainments would naturally fit him for leadership. However, he 
left the convention for the seat of war in the afternoon of March 6, 
before the first draft of the constitution had been presented and 
before the various issues which arose could have been debated ex¬ 
tensively. 

Another member of considerable experience in public affairs was 
Robert Potter, a petulant soul, if we may believe the gossip of that 
day. He had served in the assembly of his native state, North Caro¬ 
lina, was a member of the twenty-first congress, and again served 
in the state assembly. He left that state in 1835 and took up residence 
at Nacogdoches soon after. However, in the matter of experience 
in legislative and constitutive bodies, Samuel P. Carson was the 
superior of any other man in the convention. He had been a member 
of the senate of North Carolina and had served four terms in Con¬ 
gress. Furthermore, he had served as a delegate in the North Caro¬ 
lina Constitutional Convention of 1835, although he had come to Texas 
in 1834. Apparently the people of his district in North Carolina 
considered his trip to Texas merely a visit and in his absence they 
elected him to the convention. The records of the North Carolina 
convention do not indicate that his service was in any way distinctive, 
possibly due to the fact that he reported to the convention nearly 
two weeks late and suffered ill health during a considerable portion 
of his stay there. Carson was late in arriving at the Texas conven¬ 
tion also and after his arrival he was not on the floor as much as a 
number of other members; but this does not indicate that his influence 
was not great. Other men who had held public office of some dis¬ 
tinction were Martin Parmer, who had sat in the Missouri Constitu¬ 
tional Convention of 1819; and James W. Collinsworth, who had 
served as United States District Attorney in Tennessee. Thomas J. 
Rusk, a Georgia lawyer who had lost his money in a speculative 
enterprise and had come to Texas to recoup his fortune, had not 
had as much experience in public affairs as a number of other men 
in the group, but he was evidently recognized as a man of superior 
ability and the record indicates that he took a keen interest in every 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION 


249 


issue that was raised. As the chairman of the select committee to 
correct errors and phraseology in the final draft of the constitution 
he may be regarded as being more responsible than any other man 
for the final wording of that instrument. By way of apology for 
Rusk, it may be stated that the constitution was amended a number 
of times after this final draft was presented. The notable service 
Rusk later rendered as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the 
Republic of Texas and still later as United States senator from Texas 
is evidence of his extraordinary ability, and explains the influence he 
wielded over the members. 

George C. Childress is best known as the chairman of the com¬ 
mittee on a Declaration of Independence and as the probable author 
of that instrument. He was not a member of the committee for 
framing a constitution; but he participated in many discussions per¬ 
taining to it, and should be mentioned among the men who appear 
to have had most to do in the final determination of questions that 
arose. 

Three Spanish-Americans sat in the body and helped give it some 
appearance of being more than a mere assembly of disgruntled Anglo- 
Americans. They were Jose Antonio Navarro, Francisco Ruiz, and 
Lorenzo de Zavala. Of these, the last named was well known on 
two continents. As a deputy to the first Mexican National Congress, 
President of the Constituent Congress of 1824, Senator, Governor 
of the State of Mexico, Secretary of the Treasury, and Minister to 
Paris in 1833, he had run almost the complete gamut of Spanish- 
American statesmanship. His broad experience in public affairs in 
Mexico certainly must have acquainted him with Mexican institutions 
and through extensive travel and reading he had probably become 
well acquainted with those of the Anglo-Americans. He spoke 
English well, but not so fluently as Spanish. 

Others might be named as participating extensively in the proceed¬ 
ings of the body but the records of what occurred are so meager that 
it is difficult to form any concise idea of their work. It does not ap¬ 
pear that the delegates were aligned into any well-defined groups 
with any certain issues as the line of cleavage. The votes recorded 
(and it should be noted that most discussions occurred in the differ¬ 
ent committees or in the committee of the whole, where there is left 
little or no record of what happened) indicate that new alignments 
were made from time to time. Hence, leaders of groups, if there 
were any, were never sure of their followers. It appears that there 
was a large degree of independent action, and a descendent or a 
biographer of almost any delegate might go to the Journal and prove 
that his ancestor or subject was active in the proceedings. 

It has been stated that of the fifty-eight men who participated 
in the proceedings forty were under forty years of age, and that 
nearly all of them came from Southern states—eleven from the Caro- 


250 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


linas; that there were two native Texans, Navarro and Ruiz, both of 
Bexar; that there was an Englishman, a Canadian, a Spaniard born 
in Madrid, an Irishman, and a Scotchman. 

It cannot be said that there was anything remarkable about the 
experience and ability of the members of the Washington Conven¬ 
tion; for along beside men of training and outstanding talent worked 
those of lesser capacity and knowledge of statecraft. Yet, it would 
seem that the body would not suffer in comparison with the con¬ 
stituent assemblies that formed the fundamental laws of other Amer¬ 
ican states. The large number of states represented gave the body 
a wealth and variety of political institutions to draw from, and the 
earnestness and diligence of the delegates enabled it to complete its 
work in a briefer period than almost any other similar body in 
American history. 


The Work of the Convention; the Land Question 

After the committee on the constitution had been appointed, the 
convention dealt with various matters. For our purpose it is not 
necessary to take any further notice of these proceedings than to 
mention some of the different problems with which the body had to 
deal in addition to the work of constitution making. It should be 
noted that this organization was within itself the government of 
Texas while it lasted, and one of its most pressing duties was to organ¬ 
ize a provisional government that might hope to withstand the Mexi¬ 
can invasion and preserve order until the constitution could be 
approved by the voters and a regular government set up under its 
provisions. 

It is a matter of consequence that a considerable part of the time 
and efforts of the delegates had to be spent on matters that would 
not present themselves to such a body meeting under conditions that 
generally prevailed when the different constitutions of the Anglo- 
American states were formed. Such problems as that of defense, 
the condition of the army, the selection of a flag for the Republic, 
contested elections, and the election of a commander-in-chief for the 
army occupied most of the time for the first few days. 

The members of the committee on the constitution subdivided 
themselves into three committees, on the executive, legislative, and 
judicial branches respectively. Zavala was made chairman of the 
group on the executive, but we are not told who were the chairmen 
of the other two groups. Gray states that a report on a portion of 
the constitution was made on Monday, March 7, through Mr. Thomas, 
acting as spokesman. The Journals do not mention this fact, and 
it may be that Thomas's report was made informally for the infor¬ 
mation of those members not working on the committee, and that 
it was not placed before the convention in a regular way. At any 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION 


251 


rate, it seems that the committee was reaching certain agreements 
and that the time was near at hand when at least a part of their 
proposal would be finished; for on the morning of March 8, Potter 
made a proposal in regard to the land article which indicates that 
he had been defeated in the committee and was carrying his fight 
to the whole convention. His plan was to have the convention in¬ 
struct the committee on the constitution in regard to the subject 
contained in his proposal. 

The preamble of Potter’s resolution reads in part: “Whereas, 
. . . certain designing persons in Texas, combined with others who 
live in distant parts, and are not citizens of Texas, are seeking, under 
the cover of forgery or fraudulent grants to cheat the people of Texas 
out of large and valuable portions of their lands,” he would pro¬ 
pose a resolution to the effect that the “committee on the constitution 
be instructed to inquire into the propriety of inserting in that instru¬ 
ment a provision” to the effect that “no claim of eleven leagues of 
land or more shall be valid; and all titles for more than one league 
and one labor of land (Empresario’s excepted) shall be null and void 
and of no effect.” It was provided further in the resolution that all 
grants issued to any individual since the Consultation had ordered the 
land offices closed should be null and void. 

Since the land question appears to have been by far the most 
troublesome issue the convention had to face and since the public 
lands of Texas have played such a significant part in its history, 
it seems necessary to give something of the historical background 
concerning this question and to trace its progress through the con¬ 
vention with as much detail as the scant records will permit. There¬ 
fore, we shall break the continuity of the account of the general pro¬ 
ceedings of the convention and follow this one issue through to the 
final shape of its solution in the finished constitution. [Several pages 
which trace the history of the land question are here omitted.] 

Let us now return to the convention where we left it with the 
introduction of Potter’s land resolution of March 8, in which he 
suggested that the committee on the constitution inquire into the 
propriety of nullifying all land grants of more than one league and 
one labor in extent. Naturally the proposal caused something of a 
furor, although our information about it does not enable us to speak 
with certainty about what actually happened. It is not likely that 
the proposal ever had any chance of being adopted in its radical 
shape; but it placed the land question squarely before the convention, 
and must have frightened those interested in land grants. The reso¬ 
lution was seriously debated. Potter spoke at langth, and Collins- 
worth followed in opposition. Rusk opposed it, Potter took the floor 
again asking the privilege of being allowed to “explain,” and Ellis 
(Grimes was presiding), Thomas, and Parmer spoke in favor of it. 
Potter’s resolution was considered in the committee of the whole and 


252 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

rejected. Hence we have no record of the vote. In his diary for 
that day, W. F. Gray states, “and the land question also requires 
much log rolling to make it suit the existing interests or selfish views 
of members. The constitution gets on slowly.” 

On the morning of Wednesday, March 9, Mr. Parmer, for the 
committee on the constitution, reported the first draft of .that instiu- 
ment. Section 11, under the heading of “General Provisions,” pro¬ 
vides that there shall be a tribunal from whose decision there shall be 
no appeal, for adjudication of all land titles; no claim to be confirmed 
by said tribunal until Congress shall have passed on the same; nor 
shall Congress act on any claim or grant which originated previous 
to the adoption of this constitution, before the claim shall be recom¬ 
mended by said tribunal. Section 15 of the “General Provisions” de¬ 
clared void, “sales of land made by the legislature of Coahuila and 
Texas, located in Texas, and all lands, the location of which are 
unauthorized by law, and all grants, the conditions whereof have 
not been complied with; and all grants or titles issued in violation 
of the laws of the consultation; and all titles that may be hereafter 
issued unless under the authority of this constitution; and all grants 
that may have been antedated.” It was provided that grants secured 
under the colonization laws should not be invalidated. Section 12 
of this article required that lands should be sold and never given 
away, but it was provided that this should not prevent congress from 
providing for the army. Furthermore, section 13 provided for giving 
land to citizens and soldiers. 

While this first draft of the constitution was not so drastic in 
the matter of invalidating land grants as the Potter proposal, it must 
have terrified the speculators, nevertheless. However, it was not 
destined to maintain this shape in the final draft of the consti¬ 
tution. . . . 

On the afternoon of Monday, March 14, Potter proposed that 
a committee of five be appointed to draft a provision for the consti¬ 
tution on the subject of lands. It was carried, and Potter, Carson, 
Childress, Fisher and Coleman made up the committee which was 
appointed. On the same day Conrad proposed a schedule of land 
bounties to be given soldiers, each soldier to be given from 320 to 
1280 acres of land varying with the length of his service. Gray 
refers to this resolution and predicts that it will pass since “the mil¬ 
itary interest had a great ascendency in this body.” His prediction 
was sound, for one of the last acts of the convention was to pass 
this resolution with certain amendments. However, this did not be¬ 
come a part of the constitution. 

Potter reported for his committee on lands on March 15, and 
his report was referred to the committee on the constitution to cor¬ 
rect its phraseology. No copy of his report is to be found in the 
papers of the convention, but it does not seem that any changes 
of consequence were made in its provisions. 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION 


253 


The constitution as finally adopted makes no provision for a land 
tribunal. It provides for giving land to citizens and states how much 
they shall have. It declares null and void grants made by the legis¬ 
lature of Coahuila and Texas in 1834 to John T. Mason of New York 
and other grants made under the law of March 14, 1835, wherein 
eleven hundred leagues were granted to sundry individuals. It de¬ 
clares void all eleven league claims located within twenty leagues of 
the boundary of Texas and the United States, all surveys and loca¬ 
tions made since the act of the late Consultation closing the land offices, 
and all titles to land granted since that time. In the future no land 
titles should be granted except on the authority of the convention or 
of Congress. There should be a general land office created to have 
charge of the administration of the land policy of the Republic. 

The land provision incorporated in the constitution was clearly 
a compromise measure. Our information about it is meager, but 
it is evident that there were two well-defined factions; one, led by 
men like Potter and Ellis, who would have nullified not only every 
claim that appeared to have originated in an illegal or corrupt trans¬ 
action, but other claims as well which were perfectly legal but which 
grew out of a land policy that they considered unwise; the other, 
represented by Rusk, Collinsworth and others, who did not favor 
an invalidating policy. They compromised by invalidating those 
eleven league grants which were clearly illegal in that they violated 
the federal law in the matter of location in the boundary strip, to¬ 
gether with what appeared to them to be the worst of the large 
grants made by special acts of the legislature. . . . 

The Work of the Convention; Completing the Constitution 

After this survey of the land question which has taken us so far 
afield, let us turn again to the regular course of procedure in the 
convention. We have noted that the first draft of the constitution 
was reported March 9. This draft is crude and evidently was in¬ 
tended merely as a working basis. There are many details which were 
changed in the final copy; but a comparison in detail between the 
two copies would prove tedious and of no great value for the pur¬ 
poses of this paper. We have noted the changes in regard to the 
article on the public lands. 

Probably the most significant characteristic of the first copy which 
was changed by the final act had to do with the election of the 
president. Section two of article three in the first report provided 
that in case no candidate should receive a majority of the popular 
vote for president, the house of representatives should choose one of 
the two candidates receiving the highest votes. It is easy to see that 
such an arrangment would frequently leave the choice of a president 
to the house of representatives; but as finally adopted the matter 
was left entirely to the popular vote. 


254 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Another significant change made had to do with the importation 
of slaves. The first copy provided that congress may forbid impor¬ 
tation of slaves from Africa, but section nine of “General Provisions” 
in the final constitution defines the practice of the African slave trade 
as piracy. 

It is not possible to determine how the copy as proposed by the 
committee was developed into the final shape the constitution took. 
Most of the work was done in committee of the whole, concerning 
which we have no record. Furthermore, at times when the record 
covers what was done, the convention was evidently using a copy of 
the constitution unlike any to be found in any of the papers left in 
the records. So many changes were made that the document was 
turned back to Parmer and his committee for a complete rewriting. 
He reported again Sunday afternoon, March 13, but this draft is not 
published in Gammel and it is doubtful whether or not a certain copy 
in the papers and journals of the convention now in the State Library 
is the Parmer copy. 

Gray tells us that a “very pretty debate” occurred on the 13th 
on the subject of imprisonment for debt. Rusk proposed to prohibit 
imprisonment for debt except in cases of fraud. Potter, Childress, 
Carson, and Parmer favored a proposal to forbid imprisonment for 
debt under any pretense whatever. Collinsworth and Thomas joined 
Rusk in his fight for his proposal. 

On the 14th, on the motion of Rusk, the constitution was referred 
to a committee of five with directions “to correct errors and phrase¬ 
ology.” Gazley, Hamilton, Gaines, and Everett were placed on this 
committee with Rusk as chairman. By a process of elimination it is 
not difficult to arrive at the conclusion that Rusk, the only one of the 
five who ever manifested great ability at such duties, did most of the 
work .in this final revision. However, as has been noted, the conven¬ 
tion continued to amend the instrument after Rusk’s committee re¬ 
ported, so that this committee cannot be held altogether accountable 
for the final phraseology. 

The record does not show that all the constitution was ever read 
for final approval or ever approved. Parts of it had been adopted 
section by section, but the record of adoption does not cover it all. 
The last mention of the constitution in the records of the convention 
is at the three o’clock session on March 16. At this occasion the 
convention amended and approved section twelve of “General Pro¬ 
visions,” but the constitution as printed has but eleven sections in the 
“General Provisions.” 

However, Gray’s diary is much more illuminating in regard to the 
events of the last day or two of the convention. On March 16, he 
writes that some members are going home, that great confusion and 
irregularity prevails. He states that at the close of the afternoon 
session the body adjourned till nine o’clock, but met after supper 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION 


255 


“spontaneously.” The constitution was not yet ready, and the body 
adjourned till ten o’clock that evening. At ten it took up the con¬ 
stitution, which was finally adopted at twelve. Then, he states, they 
organized a provisional government and swore in the officers at four 
a. m., and adjourned till nine o’clock. There was much confusion 
at the last session on the morning of March 17, caused by an erroneous 
report that the enemy’s cavalry had been observed the day before 
crossing the Colorado at Bastrop, sixty miles away. 

Analysis of the Constitution 

The constitution of the Republic of Texas is a composite structure 
of portions of the Constitution of the United States and of several 
of the state constitutions in effect at that time. It does not appear 
that any one state constitution was followed; and where material from 
the Constitution of the United States was incorporated the wording 
was frequently changed, sometimes to no apparent advantage. In¬ 
deed, one is inclined to feel that it would have been much better to 
have followed more literally Gouverneur Morris’s lucid English of the 
federal Constitution. 

The preamble follows that of the Federal Constitution, except 
that it leaves out “more perfect Union” and changes the wording 
and punctuation slightly. 

Article one provides for the tripartite system of government and 
describes the structure of the legislature and the manner of choos¬ 
ing the members, and gives certain requirements as to procedure, 
and as to suffrage requirements. A comparison of certain sections 
of this article with the corresponding provisions of a number of state 
constitutions reveals the fact that there is nothing unique or original 
in the Texas instrument. 

Section three of this article, providing for annual elections for 
members of the house of representatives may have been adapted 
from any one of a dozen states. The provision of section seven, 
that free or slave negroes and Indians are not to be counted in deter¬ 
mining the apportionment in congress, may have been taken from 
any one of the several southern state constitutions. Other sections 
might be traced in the same manner, revealing a large number of 
possible sources. Indeed, it may be said that in the matter of choos¬ 
ing legislators, in the structure and composition of the legislature, 
and in its rules of procedure, the congress of the Republic of Texas 
was nothing more than a state legislature with its name changed. 

Article two sets forth the powers of congress. Naturally state 
constitutions could not be followed in framing this provision. Here 
we find an interesting adaptation of material drawn from article one, 
section eight of the Constitution of the United States. Paragraph 
one of that section of the Federal instrument reads: “The congress 


256 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, 
to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general 
welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts, and excises 
shall be uniform throughout the United States.” The corresponding 
provision in the Texas instrument reads: “Congress shall have power 
to levy and collect taxes and imposts, excise and tonnage duties; to 
borrow money on the faith, credit, and property of the government, 
to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general 
welfare of the Republic.” It will be seen that the principal change 
the Texans made was in the matter of punctuation, and arrangement 
of phrases, and that nothing is said about uniformity. What they 
intended this expression to mean is a matter that is difficult to deter¬ 
mine. However, it would seem that they intended: (i) to delegate 
taxing power to congress, and (2) to delegate borrowing power for 
purposes of paying the debts and providing for the common defense 
and general welfare of the Republic. No doubt they were acquainted 
with Joseph Story’s Commentaries on the Constitution of the United 
States, and he had given that interpretation to the “general welfare 
clause” in the older constitution. That is, he said it should be inter¬ 
preted to read: “The congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, 
duties, imposts and excises, in order to pay the debts, and to provide for 
the common defense and general welfare of the United States.” How¬ 
ever, Story says that “some minds of great ingenuity and liberality 
of view” have taken the position that it gave to Congress broad pow¬ 
ers to legislate for the general welfare of the nation. It appears that 
the Texans were inserting a questionable expression in their consti¬ 
tution, and it might be urged that they showed a lack of constructive 
ability in their failure to find a different expression, the meaning of 
which could never be brought into question. But this would have 
been hard to do. 

In the rest of the section on the powers of congress the Texans 
followed the Constitution of the United States in delegating to that 
body the power to regulate commerce, coin money, fix standards of 
weights and measures, establish post offices and post roads, grant 
patents and copyrights, declare war, grant letters of marque and 
reprisal, regulate captures, provide an army and navy, call out the 
militia to suppress insurrection and repel invasions. To these powers 
they added the right to grant charters of incorporation, and to pass 
laws necessary to carry out the foregoing “express grants of power” 
and “all other power granted the government or any officer.” 

In this matter the framers appear to have been inconsistent in 
following the Constitution of the United States, which provides for 
a lawmaking body with delegated powers and none other, leaving 
many powers to the states or to the people. The Texans were creat¬ 
ing a central or unitary government that would have to exercise all 
the powers of sovereignty except that retained by the people. It is 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION 


257 


true that there are some delegations of power besides those noted 
above, but the sum total of these delegated powers represents but 
a part of the many things the legslature of such a government would 
have to do. It might have been more logical to have given congress 
a general grant of legislative power and then to have applied such 
limitations as seemed to be expedient. 

Article three of the Texas constitution provides that the execu¬ 
tive authority shall be vested in a president to be elected by the 
people. He should serve three years and should not succeed himself 
in office. The prohibition against the president’s succeeding himself 
was probably inserted as a result of an aversion for the Mexican 
system, where the president had been prone to use his power to influ¬ 
ence elections. The powers of the president were much like those 
of the President of the United States. However, there was a pro¬ 
hibition against the president’s leading an army in the field except 
by the consent of congress. This, likewise, was incorporated because 
of a dislike of the Mexican system where presidents had spent so 
much time with the army. 

Furthermore, the cabinet system was definitely provided for in 
a section which authorized the president “to appoint a secretary of 
state and such other heads of departments as may be established 
by law.” 

Article four sets forth the structure of and the plan of operation 
of the judiciary. The plan followed that commonly in use in the 
southern and western states, but a comparison of the texts does not 
reveal that it was copied from any one state. There should be a 
supreme court and such inferior courts as congress might establish. 
Provision was made for dividing the Republic into districts and for 
the appointment of district judges and attorneys. These district 
courts were to be courts of first instance, while the supreme court 
should be made up of a supreme judge and the judges of the district 
courts. Unlike the United States plan the judges and district attor¬ 
neys were to be appointed by a joint ballot of both houses of congress. 
This practice was common among the states. 

The Declaration of Rights contains nothing new and consists sub¬ 
stantially of what one can find attached to the constitution of almost 
any state. Section one, declaring that all men when they form a 
social compact have equal rights, is very similar to a provision found 
in the Alabama constitution. Section three, prohibiting the state from 
showing preference to any religion is much like the first clause of 
the third amendment to the Constitution of the United States. Sec¬ 
tion six, guaranteeing jury trial and containing the “due process of 
law” clause is quite similar to that of Mississippi. It appears that 
the framers of this article had before them a copy of the Constitution 
of the United States and that of several of the southern and western 
states, and that they gathered from each whatever gems of political 


258 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


philosophy struck their fancy. But they rarely ever quote verbatim; 
at least a word or two will be changed. 

Article five is short and appears to have been sandwiched in with 
little purpose. It forbids ministers of the gospel to hold office in 
Texas and gives the oath that officers shall take. 

Under the heading of “Schedule” a number of matters peculiar 
to Texas are dealt with. It is provided that the laws in force should 
continue until repealed unless they were at variance with the terms 
of the constitution, and a plan is set forth for creating a temporary 
government to serve until the voters can pass on the constitution. 

A number of items are grouped together under the heading “Gen¬ 
eral Provisions.” It is stated that congress shall provide for a system 
of education; provision is made for the naturalization of persons 
who have been in the Republic for a period of six months; persons 
who leave the country to escape military service shall forfeit their 
lands; slaves shall remain as such, and congress shall not emancipate 
them; free negroes are forbidden to reside in the state; the importa¬ 
tion of negro slaves except from the United States is made piracy; 
each head of a family is to have a league and a labor of land; and 
the land grant to John T. Mason and certain other land grants here¬ 
tofore noted are declared null and void. 

The constitution of the Republic of Texas has the virtue of brevity, 
and its makers did not enfeeble the government they set up by numer¬ 
ous restrictions. Their following so closely the Federal Constitution 
and that of the states of the American Union produced an awkward 
result in that these instruments were framed to work under a federal 
and not a unitary plan of government. Yet, even this had its advan¬ 
tages, for in borrowing these terms and expressions from the older 
constitutions they were getting material that they understood and 
which had been clarified and defined by decades of court interpretation. 
It was not a time for experimenting; they did not even have time 
for much deliberation. Their constitution worked, and that is the 
correct test. 


Adopting the Constitution ; the Mystery of the Official Copy 

The events that followed the work of the convention at Washing¬ 
ton are well known. The people of western and middle Texas fled 
before the approach of the Mexican forces, until Houston's army 
won the victory at San Jacinto, April 21, 1836, and stopped the in¬ 
vasion. But the terror and confusion had been so great, and rumors 
of another Mexican invasion continued with such persistency, that 
the provisional government did not deem it wise to call an election 
until public confidence was in a measure restored. However, on July 
23, 1836, President Burnet issued a proclamation calling an election 
to be held on the first Monday in September to elect officers and pass 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION 


259 


on the constitution. The voters were to decide on two distinct ques¬ 
tions. First, they were to vote for or against the constitution as it 
“now” stands, and, second, they were to give or deny their assent 
to authorize congress to amend the instrument. 

The idea of authorizing congress to amend the constitution evi¬ 
dently arose as a result of criticism that had been made in regard to 
it. However, it seems that most people were of the same opinion 
as that of William H. Jack, who, in a public reply to an inquiry made 
of him as to what he thought of vesting congress with conventional 
powers to amend it, stated: 

“When I first read the constitution, as adopted by the convention, 
I was of opinion that some errors had crept into it, and hence was 
in favor of submitting to the people, whether they would adopt it 
absolutely or clothe congress with powers to amend it. . . Then 
Jack concludes by stating that on subsequent reflection it is his opinion 
that it ought to be adopted as it “now stands . . . believing that in 
the present unsettled state of the country, less injury will result from 
its adoption than by making amendments at this time.” 

At the election in September the constitution was adopted over¬ 
whelmingly and the power of amendment was withheld from Con¬ 
gress; and on Monday, October 3, 1836, the first Congress of the Re¬ 
public assembled. 

Before concluding this paper it may be worth while to take some 
notice of the history of the original copy of the constitution. An 
examination of the papers of the convention not only fails to reveal 
the official copy of that instrument, but we are unable to find even a 
complete draft of it. The official copy is not to be found in the office 
of the Secretary of State, and no one connected with that office knows 
anything about it. This has caused some writers to conclude that the 
government of the Republic never came into the possession of the 
official document, if one ever existed. Another foundation for this 
point of view is the account given by John J. Linn, who was elected, 
together with J. M. Carbajal, as a delegate from Victoria, but who 
failed to attend the convention because the immediate approach of 
Santa Anna’s forces necessitated his looking after his family. He 
states that he learned from Jesse Grimes, who was a member of the 
convention, that the constitution was “adopted at a late hour on the 
night of the seventeenth of March, but was neither engrossed nor 
enrolled for signatures of the members prior to the adjournment next 
day.” He states that the secretary was instructed to enroll it for 
presentation, but that he took it to Nashville, Tennessee, where it 
was published in one of the papers, from which it was reproduced by 
a Cincinnati paper, and from the latter copied by the Telegraph and 
Texas Register of August 3. Since no enrolled copy was in existence, 
the printed one was recognized. 

R. M. Potter, who got his information from Dr. Miller, “a gentle- 


260 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


man who was prominent in the affairs of Texas both before and after 
the Revolution/' gives a different version of the affair. He states 
that Kimble took the instrument away, that the provisional government 
found themselves without an authentic copy, and that in their des¬ 
peration they made a copy of their own, and published it. However, 
the original copy was sent in to them after a time; but they decided 
to suppress it and to use their own manufactured document. A com¬ 
parison of the last pages of the Journals with the printed constitu¬ 
tion gives a little color to Potter’s story, for we find the convention 
adopting finally the twelfth section of the article on “General Pro¬ 
visions” when the printed constitution contains but eleven sections in 
that article. Other discrepancies may be observed, also. However, 
the Journals are evidently not complete, and we have a very poor 
record of what took place on the hectic night of March 16-17 when 
the constitution evidently was adopted, although the official record does 
not show that it was. 

However, while preparing this article the writer located and man¬ 
aged to borrow a copy of the constitution of the Republic of Texas 
printed together with the Declaration of Independence in Washington, 
D. C., and bearing the date May 22, 1836. The instruments were 
printed on the authorization of Robert Hamilton and Geo. C. Chil¬ 
dress, plenipotentiaries from the Republic of Texas to the United 
States of America. A careful comparison of this copy with that 
ratified by the voters of Texas does not reveal any difference of con¬ 
sequence. 1 Following the constitution is the statement of H. S. 
Kimble, secretary of the convention to the effect that it is a true copy 
from the original filed in the archives of the convention. Kimble 
certified to the copy on March 17, 1836. Childress and Hamilton 
left Texas immediately after the convention adjourned and probably 
took this copy along with them. They arrived in Washington about 
May 22 or a few days thereafter and naturally had these instruments 
printed as soon as possible in order to make a better presentation of 
the Texas cause to the administration at Washington. There is noth¬ 
ing to indicate that the printing work was not finished with reasonable 
promptness, and if so, there was plenty of time for some of these 
copies to have been taken back to Texas before the constitution was 
published there in August. 

In a note of August 9th, to President Burnet, William H. Jack, 
Secretary of State, wrote: “I have, after much difficulty, succeeded 

1 There is considerable difference in punctuation and several signers are 
missing in the case of the Washington copy. For instance, the names of 
Samuel A. Maverick, John W. Moore and Joseph Wert are not signed to the 
Washington copy of the constitution; and S. Rhoads Fisher, John W. Moore 
and A. Briscoe are not signed to the Declaration of Independence. The name 
of Asa Brigham, which does not appear on the copy of the Declaration of 
Independence in the office of the Secretary of State at Austin, is among the 
signers of the declaration on the Washington copy. 


FRAMING THE CONSTITUTION 


261 


in having the constitution and writs of election published. I have 
ordered 250 copies, of the next paper, to contain our Constitution.” 
This was a reference to the first publication in Texas of the constitu¬ 
tion, which was made through the Telegraph and Texas Register, and 
the difficulty to which Jack refers was probably nothing more than 
the fact that there was no press in Texas to publish official documents 
and proclamations until that paper resumed publication in August. 
Thus, it seems reasonable to conclude that, even if the original con¬ 
stitution was not available, it is not probable that the provisional 
government depended on newspapers to secure its copy from which the 
instrument was copied for official publication. However this may 
be, the story of an improvised or “manufactured” official copy cannot 
be longer seriously considered. It would have been impossible for 
President Burnet and all his helpers to have improvised an instrument 
which matches so perfectly the copy of the constitution carried away 
by Hamilton and Childress and printed in Washington in May. 


CHAPTER XXIV 


THE FALL OF THE ALAMO 

Compiled by Eugene C. Barker 

[This account of the siege and fall of the Alamo is compiled chiefly from 
contemporary documents. Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapter XVIII; and Barker, 
Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 114-121; Castaneda, The 
Mexican Side of the Texas Revolution, 13-15, 101-104-] 

I. Travis’s Heroic Letter of February 24 

[On February 23, at three o’clock in the afternoon, Travis dispatched a hasty 
note to Andrew Ponton, alcalde of Gonzales, saying: “The enemy in large force 
is in sight. We want men and provisions. Send them to us. We have 150 
men and are determined to defend the Alamo to the last. Give us assistance. 
The next day he wrote the letter that has been called the most heroic document 
in American history.] 

COMMANDANCY OF THE ALAMO. 

Be jar, Feb’y 24th, 1836. 

To the People of Texas and all Americans in the World. 

Fellow Citizens and Compatriots: I am besieged, by a thousand 
or more of the Mexicans under Santa Anna. I have sustained a con¬ 
tinual bombardment and cannonade for 24 hours and have not lost a 
man. The enemy has demanded a surrender at discretion, otherwise, 
the garrison are to be put to the sword, if the fort is taken. I have 
answered the demand with a cannon shot, and our flag still waves 
proudly from the walls. I shall never surrender or retreat. Then, I 
call on you in the name of Liberty, of patriotism and everything dear 
to the American character, to come to our aid with all dispatch. 
The enemy is receiving reinforcements daily and will no doubt increase 
to three or four thousand in four or five days. If this call is neglected 
I am determined to sustain myself as long as possible and die like 
a soldier who never forgets what is due to his own honor and that 
of his country. Victory or Death. 

William Barrett Travis, Lt. Col. Comdt. 

P. S. The Lord is on our side. When the enemy appeared in 
sight we had not three bushels of com. We have since found in 
deserted houses 80 or 90 bushels and got into the walls 20 or 30 head 
of beeves. Travis. 


262 


THE FALL OF THE ALAMO 


263 


II. Governor Smith’s Appeal for Reinforcements 

[In reply to Travis’s note of the 23d to Andrew Ponton, thirty-two men 
marched from Gonzales to support him, and, passing through the enemy’s lines, 
entered the Alamo on the night of March 1. Ponton sent the letter to San 
Felipe, and on February 27 Governor Smith published in handbill form an 
appeal to the people of Texas for reinforcements.] 

Fellow Citizens and Countrymen: The foregoing official com¬ 
munication from Col. Travis, now in command at Bexar, needs no 
comment. The garrison, composed of only 150 Americans, engaged 
in a deadly conflict with 1,000 of the mercenary troops of the Dicta¬ 
tor, who are daily receiving reinforcements, should be a sufficient 
call upon you without saying more. However secure, however for¬ 
tunate, our garrison may be, they have not the provisions nor the 
ammunition to stand more than a thirty days’ siege at farthest. 

I call upon you as an officer, I implore you as a man, to fly 
to the aid of your besieged countrymen and not permit them to be 
massacred by a mercenary foe. I slight none! The call is upon ALL 
who are able to bear arms, to rally without one moment’s delay, or 
in fifteen days the heart of Texas will be the seat of war. This is 
not imaginary. The enemy from 6,000 to 8,000 strong are on our 
border and rapidly moving by forced marches for the colonies. The 
campaign has commenced. We must promptly meet the enemy or 
all will be lost. Do you possess honor? Suffer it not to be insulted 
or tarnished! Do you possess patriotism? Evince it by your bold, 
prompt and manly action! If you possess even humanity you will 
rally without a moment’s delay to the aid of your besieged country¬ 
men ! 

But no response could be made to this appeal in time to save the 
garrison. 

III. Why Fannin Failed to Reinforce Travis 

[At the same time that Travis wrote to Ponton he sent a messenger to 
Fannin at Goliad, asking for assistance. Fannin had some four hundred and 
twenty men there, and on February 26 he started with most of them for San 
Antonio, but shortly afterward changed his mind and returned to the fort at 
Goliad, which he began to strengthen. The account of his movements and the 
reasons therefor are given in a letter written by his aid, John Sowers Brooks 
on March 2]. 

We marched at the time appointed, with . . . nearly the whole force 
at Goliad, leaving only one Company of Regulars to guard the Fort. 
Our baggage wagons and artillery were all drawn by oxen (no broken 
horses could be obtained) and there were but a few yokes of them. 
In attempting to cross the San Antonio River, three of our wagons 
broke down and it was with the utmost labor and personal hazard, 
that our four pieces of cannon were conveyed safely across. We 
remained there during the day, with our ammunition wagon on the 


264 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


opposite side of the River. During the night, some of the oxen 
strayed off and could not be found the next morning. Our situation 
became delicate and embarrassing in the extreme. If we proceeded 
we must incur the risk of starvation, and leave our luggage and 
artillery heind. The country between us and Bexar is entirely 
unsettled, and there would be but little hope of obtaining provisions 
on the route and we would be able only to carry 12 rounds of car¬ 
tridges each. Every one felt an anxiety to relieve our friends, who 
we had been informed, had retired to the Alamo, a fortress in Bexar, 
resolved to hold out, until our arrival. Yet every one saw the impro¬ 
priety, if not the impossibility of our proceeding under existing cir¬ 
cumstances and it was equally apparent to all that our evacuation of 
Goliad, would leave the whole frontier from Bexar to the coast open 
to the incursions of the enemy, who were then concentrating at Laredo 
and the provisions, clothing, military stores, et cetera, at Dimmitt’s 
Landing and Matagorda, perhaps all that were in Texas, would even¬ 
tually be lost. Intelligence also reached us that the advance of 
Santa Anna’s lower division had surprised San Patricio about 50 
miles in front of our position and put the whole garrison under the 
command of Col. Johnson to the sword. Five of them have reached 
this place. Col. Johnson is one of them, and they are probably all 
that have escaped. Capt. Pearson of the volunteers, was killed with 
several others, after they had surrendered. The war is to be one of 
extermination. Each party seems to understand that no quarters are 
to be given or asked. We held a Council of War in the bushes on 
the bank of the River; and after a calm review of all these circum¬ 
stances, it was concluded to return to Goliad, and place the Fort in 
a defensible condition. 

IV. Travis’s Last Appeal for Aid 

[Travis’s last messages were borne through the besieging lines by John W. 
Smith on the night of March 3rd. A letter to the president of the convention 
gave a report of the siege since February 25th.] 

COMMANDANCY OF THE ALAMO, 

Be jar, March 3, 1836. 

Sir: In the present confusion of the political authorities of the 
country, and in the absence of the commander-in-chief, I beg leave 
to communicate to you the situation of this garrison. You have doubt¬ 
less already seen my official report of the action of the twenty-fifth 
ult. made on that day to Gen. Sam Houston, together with the various 
communications heretofore sent by express, I shall therefore confine 
myself to what has transpired since that date. 

From the twenty-fifth to the present date the enemy have kept 
up a bombardment from two howitzers—one a five-and-a-half-inch, 


THE FALL OF THE ALAMO 


265 


and the other an eight-inch—and a heavy cannonade from two long 
nine pounders, mounted on a battery on the opposite side of the river 
at a distance of four hundred yards from our wall. During this period 
the enemy have been busily employed in encircling us in with en¬ 
trenched encampments on all sides, at the following distance, to wit: 
In Be jar, four hundred yards west; in Lavilleta, three hundred yards 
south; at the powder house, one thousand yards east of south; on the 
ditch, eight hundred yards northeast, and at the old mill, eight hundred 
yards north. Notwithstanding all this, a company of thirty-two men 
from Gonzales, made their way into us on the morning of the first 
inst. at three o’clock, and Colonel J. B. Bonham (a courier from Gon¬ 
zales) got in this morning at eleven o’clock, without molestation. I 
have fortified this place, so that the walls are generally proof against 
cannon balls; and I still continue to entrench on the inside, and 
strengthen walls by throwing up the dirt. At least two hundred shells 
have fallen inside of our works without having injured a single man; 
indeed we have been so fortunate as not to loose a man from any 
cause, and we have killed many of the enemy. The spirits of my men 
are still high, although they have had much to depress them. We 
have contended for ten days against an enemy whose numbers are 
variously estimated at from fifteen hundred to six thousand men, with 
General Ramirez Siesma [Sesma] and Colonel Batris, the aid-de-camp 
of Santa Anna, at their head. A report was circulated that Santa 
Anna himself was with the enemy, but I think it was false. A rein¬ 
forcement of about one thousand men is now entering Be jar, from 
the west, and I think it more than probable that Santa Anna is now 
in town, from the rejoicing we hear. 

Col. Fannin is said to be on the march to this place with reinforce¬ 
ments, but I fear it is not true, as I have repeatedly sent to him for 
aid without receiving any. Col. Bonham, my special messenger, arrived 
at La Bahia fourteen days ago, with a request for aid; and on the 
arrival of the enemy in Bejar, ten days ago, I sent an express to 
Colonel F., which arrived at Goliad on the next day, urging him to 
send us reinforcements; none have yet arrived. I look to the colonies 
alone for aid; unless it arrives soon, I shall have to fight the enemy 
on his own terms. I will, however, do the best I can under the cir¬ 
cumstances; and I feel confident that the determined valor and des¬ 
perate courage, heretofore exhibited by my men, will not fail them in 
the last struggle; and although they may be sacrificed to the vengence 
of a Gothic enemy, the victory will cost the enemy so dear, that it will 
be worse for him than a defeat. I hope your honorable body will 
hasten on reinforcements, ammunition, and provisions to our aid as 
soon as possible. We have provisions for twenty days for the men we 
have. Our supply of ammunition is limited. At least five hundred 
pounds of cannon powder, and two hundred rounds of six, nine, 
twelve and eighteen pound balls, ten kegs of rifle powder and a supply 


266 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


4 (1 


of lead, should be sent to the place without delay, under a sufficient 
guard. 

If these things are promptly sent, and large reinforcements are 
hastened to this frontier, this neighborhood will be the great and 
decisive ground. The power of Santa Anna is to be met here, or in 
the colonies; we had better meet them here than to suffer a war of 
evastation to rage in our settlements. A blood red banner waves 
from the church of Bejar, and in the camp above us, in token that the 
war is one of vengence against rebels; they have declared us as such; 
demanded that we should surrender at discretion, or that this garrison 
should be put to the sword. Their threats have had no influence on 
me or my men, but to make all fight with desperation, and that high- 
souled courage which characterizes the patriot, who is willing to die 
in defence of his country’s liberty and his own honor. 

The citizens of this municipality are all our enemies, except those 
ho have joined us heretofore. We have but three Mexicans now in 
the fort; those who have not joined us, in this extremity, should be 
declared public enemies, and their property should aid in paying the 
expenses of the war. 

The bearer of this will give your honorable body a statement 
more in detail, should he escape through the enemy’s lines. 

God and Texas—Victory or Death. 

Your obedient servant, 

W. Barrett Travis, Lieut. Col. Comm. 

P. S. The enemy’s troops are still arriving, and the reinforce¬ 
ment will probably amount to two or three thousand. T. 


i 


V. Almonte’s Account of the Siege 

[The movements of the Mexicans against the Alamo can be followed in the 
words of Colonel Almonte, whose diary was found at San Jacinto by Dr. 
Anson Jones. The first division of Santa Anna’s army reached San Antonio 
on February 23rd. The Texans were taken by surprise, and retired to the 
Alamo without resistance. Later, as we have seen from Travis’s letter, they 
were fortunate enough to collect some supplies within the walls. Almonte’s 
account of the next week’s action is as follows:] 

Thursday, 25th.—The firing from our batteries was commenced 
early. The general-in-chief, with the battalion de Cazadores, crossed 
the river and posted themselves in the Alamo; that is to say, in the 
houses near the fort. A new fortification was commenced by us near 
the house of McMullen. In the random firing, the enemy wounded 
four of the Cazadores de Matamoros battalion, and two of the battalion 
of Ximenes and killed one corporal and a soldier of the battalion of 
Matamoros. Our fire ceased in the afternoon. In the night two 
batteries were erected by us on the other side of the river, in the 
Alameda of the Alamo; the battalion of Matamoros was also posted 


THE FALL OF THE ALAMO 


267 


there, and the cavalry was posted on the hills to the east of the enemy, 
and in the road from Gonzales at the Casa Mata Antigua. At half¬ 
past eleven at night we retired. The enemy in the night burnt the 
straw and wooden houses in their vicinity, but did not attempt to set 
fire with their guns to those in our rear. A strong north wind com¬ 
menced at nine at night. 

Friday, 26th.—The northern wind continued very strong; the 
thermometer fell to 39, and during the rest of the day remained at 60. 
At daylight there was a slight skirmish between the enemy and a small 
party of the division of the east, under the command of General Sesma. 
During the day the firing from our cannon was continued. The enemy 
did not reply except now and then. At night the enemy burnt the 
small houses near the parapet of the battalion of San Luis, on the 
other side of the river. Some sentinels were advanced. In the course 
of the day the enemy sallied out for wood and water, and were 
opposed by our marksmen. The northern wind continues. 

Saturday, 27th.—Lieutenant-was sent with a party of men 

for corn, cattle, and hogs, to the farms of Seguin and Flores. It was 
determined to cut off the water from the enemy on the side next the 
old mill. There was little firing from either side during the day. The 
enemy worked hard all day to repair some intrenchments. In the after¬ 
noon the President was observed by the enemy, and fired at. In the 
night a courier was despatched to Mexico, informing the government 
of the taking of Bexar. 

Sunday, 28th.—News received that a reinforcement of 200 men 
was coming to the enemy by the road from La Bahia. The cannon¬ 
ading was continued. 

Monday, 29th.—In the afternoon, the battalion of Allende took 
post at the east of the Alamo. The President reconnoitred. At mid¬ 
night General Sesma left the camp with the cavalry of Dolores and 
the infantry of Allende, to meet the enemy coming from La Bahia 
to the relief of the Alamo. 

Tuesday, March 1st.—Early in the morning General Sesma wrote 
from the Mission of Espada that there was no enemy, or traces of 
any, to be discovered. The cavalry and infantry returned to camp. 
At twelve o’clock the President went out to reconnoitre the mill site 
on the northwest of the Alamo. Colonel Ampudia was commissioned 
to construct more trenches. In the afternoon the enemy fired two 
twelve-pound shots at the house of the President, one of which 
struck it. 

Wednesday, 2nd.—Information was received that there was corn 

at the farm of Seguin, and Lieutenant-with a party sent for 

it. The President discovered in the afternoon a covered road within 
pistol-shot of the Alamo, and posted the battalion of Ximenes there. 

Thursday, 3rd.—The enemy fired a few cannon and musket shot 
at the city. I wrote to Mexico, directing my letters to be sent to 




268 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Bexar—that before three months the campaign would be ended. The 
general-in-chief went out to reconnoitre. A battery was erected on 
the north of the Alamo, within pistol-shot. Official despatches were 
received from Urrea, announcing that he had routed the colonists of 
San Patricio, killing sixteen, and taking twenty-one prisoners. The 
bells were rung. The battalions of Zapadores, Aldama, and Toluca 
arrived. The enemy attempted a sally in the night, at the sugar mill, 
but were repulsed by our advance. 

Friday, 4th.—Commenced firing early, which the enemy did not 
return. In the afternoon one or two shots were fired by them. A 
meeting of Generals and Colonels was held. After a long conference, 
Cos, Castrillon, and others, were of opinion that the Alamo should 
be assaulted after the arrival of two twelve-pounders expected on the 
7th instant. The President, General Ramirez Sesma, and myself, were 
of opinion that the twelve-pounders should not be waited for, but 
the assault made. In this state things remained, the General not 
.coming to any definite resolution. 

VI. Santa Anna’s Orders for the Assault 

[At two o’clock in the afternoon of March 5th, Santa Anna issued secret 
orders to prepare for storming the Alamo at four o’clock the following 
morning.] 

To the Generals, Chiefs of Sections and Commanding Officers: 

The time has come to strike a decisive blow upon the enemy 
occupying the fortress of the Alamo. Consequently, His Excellency, 
the General-in-chief, has decided that, to-morrow at 4 o’clock a. m., 
the columns of attack shall be stationed at musket-shot distance from 
the first entrenchments, ready for the charge, which shall commence, 
at a signal to be given with the bugle, from the northern battery. 

The first column will be commanded by General Don Martin Per- 
fecto de Cos, and, in his absence, by myself. 

The Permanent Battalion of Aldama (except the company of 
grenadiers) and the three right centre companies of the Active Bat¬ 
talion of San Luis, will compose this first column. 

The second column will be commanded by Colonel Don Francisco 
Duque, and, in his absence, by General Don Manuel Fernandez Castril¬ 
lon; it will be composed of the Active Battalion of Toluca (except 
the company of grenadiers) and the three remaining centre companies 
of the Active Battalion of San Luis. 

The third column will be commanded by Colonel Jose Maria 
Romero, and, in his absence by Colonel Mariano Salas; it will be com¬ 
posed of the Permanent Battalions of Matamoros and Ximenes. 

The fourth column will be commanded by Colonel Juan Morales,’ 
and, in his absence, by Colonel Jose Minon; it will be composed of 


THE FALL OF THE ALAMO 


269 


the light companies of the Battalions of Matamoros and Ximenes, and 
of the Active Battalion of San Luis. 

His Excellency, the General-in-chief, will, in due time, designate 
the points of attack, and give his instructions to the commanding 
officers. 

The reserve will be composed of the Battalion of Engineers and 
the five companies of grenadiers of the Permanent Battalions of 
Matamoros, Ximenes and Aldama, and the Active Battalions of Toluca 
and San Luis. 

This reserve will be commanded by the General-in-chief in per¬ 
son, during the attack; but Colonel Agustin Amat will assemble this 
party, which will report to him, this evening, at 5 o’clock, to be marched 
to the designated station. 

The first column will carry ten ladders, two crow bars and two 
axes; the second, ten ladders; the third, six ladders; and the fourth, 
two ladders. 

The men carrying the ladders will sling their guns on their 
shoulders, to be enabled to place the ladders wherever they may be 
required. 

The companies of grenadiers will be supplied with six packages 
of cartridges to every man, and the centre companies with two pack¬ 
ages and two spare flints. The men will wear neither overcoats nor 
blankets, nor anything that may impede the rapidity of their motions. 
The commanding officers will see that the men have the chin straps 
of their caps down, and that they wear either shoes or sandals. 

The troops composing the columns of attack will turn in to sleep 
at dark; to be in readiness to move at 12 o’clock at night. 

Recruits deficient in instruction will remain in their quarters. The 
arms, principally the bayonets, should be in perfect order. 

As soon as the moon rises, the centre companies of the Active 
Battalion of San Luis will abandon the points they are now occupying 
on the line, in order to have time to prepare. 

The cavalry, under Colonel Joaquin Ramirez y Sesma, will be 
stationed at the Alameda, saddling up at 3 o’clock a. m. It shall be 
its duty to scour the country, to prevent the possibility of an escape. 

The honor of the nation being interested in this engagement 
against the bold and lawless foreigners who are opposing us, His 
Excellency expects that every man will do his duty, and exert himself 
to give a day of glory to the country, and of gratification to the 
Supreme Government, who will know how to reward the distinguished 
deeds of the brave soldiers of the Army of Operations. 

VII. Santa Anna’s Report of the Fall of the Alamo 

[Santa Anna’s official report to the war department of the fall of the Alamo 
is in some particulars undoubtedly false—as, for example, in the numbers which 
he gives—but with full allowance for misrepresentations, it pictures a thrilling 
engagement.] 


270 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Most Excellent Sir: Victory belongs to the army, which, at this 
very moment, 8 o’clock a. m., achieved a complete and glorious triumph 
that will render its memory imperishable. 

As I had stated in my report to Your Excellency of the taking 
of this city, on the 27th of last month, I awaited the arrival of the 
first brigade of infantry to commence active operations against the 
fortress of the Alamo. However, the whole brigade having been 
delayed beyond my expectation, I ordered that three of its battalions, 
viz., the Engineers, Aldama, and Toluca, should force their march 
to join me. These troops together with the Battalions of Matamoros, 
Ximenes, and San Luis Potosi, brought the force at my disposal, 
recruits excluded, up to 1400 Infantry. This force, divided into four 
columns of attack, and a reserve, commenced the attack at 5 o’clock 
a. m. They met with a stubborn resistance, the combat lasting more 
than one hour and a half, and the reserve having to be brought into 
action. 

The scene offered by this engagement was extraordinary. The 
men fought individually, vieing with each other in heroism. Twenty- 
one pieces of artillery, used by the enemy with the most perfect accu¬ 
racy, the brisk fire of musketry, which illuminated the interior of 
the fortress and its walls and ditches, could not check our dauntless 
soldiers, who are entitled to the consideration of the Supreme Gov¬ 
ernment, and to the gratitude of the nation. 

The Fortress is now in our power, with its artillery, stores, etc. 
More than 600 corpses of foreigners were buried in the ditches and 
intrenchments, and a great many, who had escaped the bayonet of the 
infantry, fell in the vicinity under the sabres of the cavalry. 1 I can 
assure Your Excellency that few are those who bore to their asso¬ 
ciates the tidings of their disaster. 

Among the corpses are those of Bowie and Travis, who styled 
themselves Colonels, and also that of Crockett, and several leading 
men, who had entered the fortress with dispatches from their Con¬ 
vention. We lost about 70 men killed and 300 wounded, among whom 
are 25 officers. The cause for which they fell renders their loss less 
painful, as it is the duty of the Mexican soldier to die for the defense 
of the rights of the nation; and all of us were ready for any sacrifice 
to promote this fond object; nor will we hereafter, suffer any for¬ 
eigners, whatever their origin may be, to insult our country and to 
pollute its soil. 

I shall, in due time, send to Your Excellency a circumstantial 

1 Ramon Caro, Santa Anna’s secretary, published in 1837 his True Account 
of the First Texas Campaign, in which he says of Santa Anna’s figures: “In 
the report made on that date to the supreme government by His Excellency it 
is stated that more than 600 of the enemy were killed. I myself wrote that 
report and must now confess that I put down that number at the command of 
His Excellency. In stating the truth now, I must say that only 183 men were 
killed.’’ 


THE FALL OF THE ALAMO 


271 


report of this glorious triumph. Now I have only time to congratu¬ 
late the nation and the President ad interim , to whom I request you 
to submit this report. 

The bearer takes with him one of the flags of the enemy’s bat¬ 
talions, captured to-day. The inspection of it will show plainly the 
true intention of the treacherous colonists, and of their abettors, who 
came from the ports of the United States of the North. 


God and Liberty! 


Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. 
Headquarters, Bexar, March 6, 1836. 


To His Excellency, the Secretary of War and Navy, General Jose 
Maria Tornel. 


VIII. Ruiz’s Report of the Fall of the Alamo 

[Colonel Francisco Ruiz, the alcalde of San Antonio, gives some important 
additional details. He says: ] 

On the 6th March (1836) at 3 a. m., General Santa Anna at the 
head of 4000 men advanced against the Alamo. The infantry, artil¬ 
lery and cavalry had formed about 1000 varas from the walls of the 
same fortress. The Mexican army charged and were twice repulsed 
by the deadly fire of Travis’s artillery which resembled a constant 
thunder. At the third charge the Toluca battalion commenced to scale 
the walls and suffered severely. Out of 830 men only 130 were left 
alive. 

When the Mexican army entered the walls, I with the political 
chief (gefe politico ) Don Ramon Musquiz and other members of the 
corporation, accompanied by the curate, Don Refugio de la Garza, 
who by Santa Anna’s orders, had assembled during the night at a 
temporary fortification on portero Street, with the object of attending 
the wounded, etc. As soon as the storming commenced we crossed 
the bridge on Commerce street, with this object in view and about 
100 yards from the same a party of Mexican dragoons fired upon us 
and compelled us to fall back on the river and the place we occupied 
before. Half an hour had elapsed when Santa Anna sent one of his 
aide de camps with an order for us to come before him. He directed 
me to call on some of the neighbors to come with carts to carry the 
[Mexican] dead to the cemetery and to accompany him, as he was 
desirous to have Col. Travis, Bowie and Crockett shown to him. 

On the north battery of the fortress convent, lay the lifeless body 
of Col. Travis on the gun carriage shot only through the forehead. 
Towards the west, and in a small fort opposite the city, we found 
the body of Col. Crockett. Col. Bowie was found dead in his bed in 
one of the rooms on the south side. 

Santa Anna, after all the Mexican bodies had been taken out, 


272 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ordered wood to be brought to burn the bodies of the Texans. He 
sent a company of dragoons with me to bring wood and dry branches 
from the neighboring forests. About three o’clock in the afternoon of 
March 6, we laid the wood and dry branches upon which a pile of 
dead bodies were placed, more wood was piled on them and another 
pile of bodies was brought, and in this manner they were all arranged 
in layers. Kindling wood was distributed through the pile and about 
5 o’clock in the evening it was lighted. 

The dead Mexicans of Santa Anna were taken to the graveyard, 
but not having sufficient room for them, I ordered some to be thrown 
into the river, which was done on the same day. 

The gallantry of the few Texans, who defended the Alamo was 
really wondered at by the Mexican army. Even the generals were 
astonished at their vigorous resistance and how dearly victory was 
bought. 

The generals, who under Santa Anna participated in the storming 
of the Alamo, were Juan Amador, Castrillon, Ramirez Sesma, and 
Andrade. 

The men burnt [Texans] were one hundred and eighty-two. I 
was an eye-witness for as Alcalde of San Antonio, I was, with some 
of the neighbors, collecting the dead bodies and placing them on the 
funeral pyre. 


Francisco Antonio Ruiz. 


CHAPTER XXV 


GOLIAD 

By Ruby Cumby Smith 
I. The Goliad Campaign 

[This selection is from the writer’s “James W. Fannin, Jr., in the Texas 
Revolution,” in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XXIII, 272^-283. The 
remainder of the article is in the same volume, pages 80-90, 171-203.] 

(a) The Orders to Retreat 

On March 4, 1836, Houston was elected commander-in-chief of the 
army of the Republic of Texas, and on March 7, he took the field 
with the determination of relieving Travis in the Alamo. To aid him 
in this determination, he sent an order from the Colorado by way of 
Gonzales to Fannin to meet him with all his available forces on the 
west side of the Cibolo. This order went through the hands of Colonel 
Neill, commanding at Gonzales, and it was forwarded to Fannin at 
Goliad, reaching there on March 11. However, on reaching Gonzales 
and learning of the fall of the Alamo, Houston adopted another course, 
and sent the following letter to Fannin: 

Headquarters, Gonzales, March 11, 1836. 

To Colonel J. W. Fannin, Commanding at Goliad: 

Sir: You will as soon as practicable after the receipt of this order, fall 
back on Guadalupe Victoria, with your command and such artillery as can 
be brought with expedition. The remainder will be sunk in the river. You 
will take the necessary measures for the defence of Victoria, and forward one- 
third the number of your effective men to this point, and remain in command 
until further orders. 

Every facility is to be afforded to women and children who may be desirous 
of leaving that place, Goliad. Previous to abandoning Goliad, you will take 
the necessary measures to blow up the fortress; and do so before leaving the 
vicinity. The immediate advance of the enemy will be confidently expected, 
as well as a rise of water. Prompt movements are, therefore, highly important. 

Sam Houston, 

Commander-in-chief of the Army. 

Thus, there were two orders to retreat: (1) the one to relieve 
Bexar; (2) the one to retire to Victoria. I believe it is the confusing 

273 


274 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


of these orders that has led many people to believe that Fannin refused 
absolutely to obey General Houston. General Houston himself in a 
speech in the United States Senate, February 28, 1859, declared that 
he ordered Fannin to fall back to Victoria and that he received an 
answer from Fannin stating that he had received Houston’s order, 
had held a council of war, that he had determined to defend the place 
and called it Fort Defiance, and had taken the responsibility to disobey 
the order. 

From a study of the sources, we believe that General Houston 
himself was confusing the answer to his first order—if Fannin wrote 
one—as the answer to his second order. That Fannin and his men 
were anxious to go to the relief of Bexar has already been shown; 
but they were unwilling to go at the risk of all being murdered on 
the way and of exposing the whole country between Bexar and the 
coast to the enemy. Moreover, on March 10, John Sowers Brooks 
wrote in his last letter from Goliad before Houston’s first order could 
have reached there that it was believed in Goliad that Santa Anna 
intended to detach 1000 men from Bexar to form a junction with the 
650 men in San Patricio and then reduce Goliad. With this knowl¬ 
edge in his possession, we believe that if Fannin wrote Houston that 
he had taken it upon himself to disobey any order, it was this order to 
march to the relief of Bexar, and not the one to retreat to Victoria. 

Positive evidence that Fannin was attempting to retreat to Victoria 
may be found in two letters which Fannin wrote from Goliad, but 
which fell into the hands of Urrea and were translated into Spanish 
and published in his Diario in 1838. These show that Fannin was 
having difficulty in retreating to Victoria, but that he was firm in his 
resolution to do so. The first of the letters is an order to Colonel 
A. C. Horton to hasten forward the cattle, horses, and mules to aid 
him in the retreat. An extract from it re-translated into English 
reads: 

Yours of yesterday received rather late in the afternoon. I wish to inform 
you that as soon as the party of 200 men under the command of Colonel Ward, 
which I look for between 9 and 10 tonight, returns, overcoming all difficulties, 
I shall march to Victoria in compliance with the orders of General Houston. 
Therefore, if you cannot advance to this point, you will probably overtake me 
on the way. 

The second letter is to Captain Sam A. White at Victoria urging 
him also to hasten forward the carts, oxen, etc., for the retreat, and 
ordering that ammunition be sent for the army along the Colorado. 
An extract from it reads: “The division under the orders of Colonel 
Ward has not yet arrived, but as quickly as they do, we shall march 
upon Victoria, which point I shall defend as quickly as possible.” 

It is hardly possible that Fannin would have written these officers 
urging them to aid him in his retreat, and at the same time have 
written General Houston that he refused to do so. 


GOLIAD 


275 


Again, Desauque, the courier who brought the message to Fannin 
to retreat to Victoria, was present at the battle of Coleto, was cap¬ 
tured there, and was shot on March 27 along with the other volunteers. 
It is not likely that Fannin would have sent so important a reply by 
another messenger, or that Desauque would have returned to Goliad 
after delivering the message to Houston. 

Thus, the evidence examined shows that there were two orders to 
retreat, one to Bexar and the other to Victoria, and that Fannin, 
though possibly refusing to obey the first, was using every effort to 
obey the second. 


( b ) The Division of Fannin’s Forces 

With the arrival of the Mexican forces, the Texans, especially 
those in the exposed areas, began to flee towards the east. Linn tells 
of his work as alcalde of Victoria, in advising the people of that 
locality to seek places of safety. The army naturally aided in this 
work. On the evening of March 10, because of the personal appeal 
of Mr. Ayres of Refugio, Captain King with 28 or 30 men was sent 
from Goliad to Refugio to aid in bringing off some families there. 
King, on reaching Refugio, however, was confronted by the Mexicans 
and forced into the Mission, from which place he, nevertheless, man¬ 
aged to send back to Goliad for aid. Colonel Ward with 150 men 
was at once dispatched to King’s relief, leaving on the morning of 
March 12. This was the first of the unfortunate occurrences which 
led to Fannin’s capture; for if Fannin’s men had not been divided, 
his retreat would have been sooner effected, and the men under Ward 
and King added to Fannin’s force at the Coleto might have saved the 
day for the Americans. Again, Urrea would not have learned so 
definitely of Fannin’s plans, through the captured messages, and would 
not have made such strenuous efforts to destroy Ward, with whom 
“Fannin proposed to make himself invincible.” 

Yet we cannot blame Fannin either for wishing to furnish protec¬ 
tion to exposed families, or to help his own men in distress; and if 
the rest of his retreat could have been accomplished with haste, even 
after he learned of the disaster to Ward, he might have still escaped 
to Victoria, if he had managed skillfully. The thing which we can 
blame Fannin, as well as Ward and King for, was their slowness to 
execute any movement they undertook. 

Ward reached Refugio on the afternoon of March 12 and relieved 
King. It was possibly his plan to return on the 14th. Bernard tells 
that King after being relieved straggled off to some ranches where 
the people had shown hostility. Another account says that King re¬ 
fused to serve under Ward and left. At any rate, the forces of 
King and Ward were separated, and thus each became an easy prey 
for the Mexicans. 


276 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Urrea’s forces early on the morning of March 14 attacked Ward, 
who had sought refuge in the mission, but were forced to retire. 
Later in the day while attempting to dislodge Ward, Urrea was at¬ 
tacked by King’s men from the rear. Urrea’s reserve cavalry then 
pursued King and his men and succeeded in killing eleven of them 
and taking seven prisoners. 

Finding himself unable to capture Ward during the day, Urrea 
placed guards around the mission at night to prevent Ward’s escape; 
but almost miraculously, without Urrea’s knowledge, the Americans 
got away, aided as Urrea says by the “darkness of the night, a strong 
norther, and rain.” They were followed on the 15th. Sixteen were 
killed that day, and thirty-one made prisoners. The next day fourteen 
more were captured. About thirty of these prisoners, belonging 
mainly to King’s company, were shot by Urrea’s consent on March 
16; the others being Mexicans were set free. The remainder of Ward’s 
men succeeded in reaching Victoria, where on March 22, one hundred 
of them surrendered to Urrea. These, on March 26, were sent back 
to Goliad, and on March 27 were shot. 


(c) The Retreat from Goliad 

Houston’s order to retreat to Victoria reached Fannin at Goliad 
either on the evening of March 13 or the morning of March 14, and 
Fannin set about to obey it. The messages to Colonel Horton and to 
Captain White, written on March 14, expressing a determination to 
retreat as soon as Ward returned, have already been noted. The 
message to Horton also says that Fannin was having difficulties in 
retreating. What these difficulties were cannot with accuracy be deter¬ 
mined; but Linn tells us that it was because his men declared that 
they had come for a brush with the Mexicans and feared that by 
leaving Goliad they would lose the opportunity of having it, and that 
Fannin was powerless to control them. Other difficulties might have 
been those attendant upon the dismantling of the fort, the lack of 
roads between Victoria and Goliad, and the excessive cold. 

Fannin, it will be remembered, looked for Ward to return between 
9 and 10 o’clock on March 14. Messages were sent him daily, but 
these were all intercepted by the Mexicans; and nothing was heard 
from him till 4 p. m. on March 17, when Captain Frazier, sent out 
as a last resort, returned with the news of the escape of his men from 
the mission and the murder of King’s men. Even now at Frazier’s 
return, if Fannin had been prepared to depart at once, he might have 
reached Victoria that night, because Urrea had only 70 men, under 
Captain Ireata, between Victoria and Goliad. Again Urrea’s own 
troops returning from Refugio were too fatigued to pursue him, and 
the reinforcements expected from San Antonio, 500 men of the Jimenez 
and San Luis batteries, which played a decisive part in the battle of 


GOLIAD 


277 


the Coleto, had not yet arrived. Yet Bernard tells us that, though the 
Americans realized that retreat was necessary, they did not propose 
to run. This is likely the reason that they were allowed to spend 
the 18th in useless skirmishing, though, in all probability, it was a 
part of Urrea’s program to annoy the Americans each day till the 
Mexicans were ready for a final attack. This skirmishing animated 
the Americans; yet, as Bernard points out, it was a bad thing for 
them, for (i) it wasted a day for them; (2) their horses needed for 
the retreat were tired down by it; and (3) their oxen which had been 
gotten up for the purpose of drawing the carts remained a whole day 
without food. The slowness of these teams was one of the disastrous 
factors for the Americans in the retreat. The skirmishing also in¬ 
spired the Americans with a false idea of their superiority in arms 
and gave them a false confidence in their ability to escape from the 
Mexicans. 

Nothing more clearly shows the contempt which the Americans 
held for the Mexicans and the false sense of security possessed by 
them than do the details of this retreat. Aided by a dense fog, they 
started on the morning of March 19. Horton, who on March 14 had 
arrived to assist in the retreat, acted as scout. Having gone a mile 
past Manahuila Creek, or seven miles from Goliad, the entire party 
stopped for an hour to graze their oxen and to have breakfast. They 
had gone perhaps ten miles further on their slow journey when they 
sighted the Mexicans in their rear. 

Meanwhile, Urrea on his part, had doubted that the Americans 
would retreat, and was preparing to lay siege to the fort. On learning, 
however, that the Americans had really escaped, he ordered Garay 
with the artillery and baggage to reconnoitre and occupy the fort, and 
he himself at 11 o’clock with 370 infantry and 80 cavalry started in 
pursuit. He got sight of the Americans at 1130 o’clock. 

The Americans now halted and shot at the Mexicans, but perceiv¬ 
ing that the Mexicans were too far off, they took up their march 
again. They went perhaps a mile, when in crossing a depression their 
ammunition cart broke down. They were suddenly cut off by the 
Mexican cavalry from a wood, one-half a mile distant, which they 
were trying to reach, and soon found themselves completely surrounded 
by the enemy. 


( d ) The Battle of the Coleto 

Fannin now completely surrounded, arranged his men in a hollow 
square. In the front were placed the Red Rovers and the New Orleans 
Greys; in the rear Duval’s Mustangs, on the sides the other troops. 
Urrea stationed the Jimenez Battery under Salas in the front, the 
battery under Nunez in the rear; Morales and his cazadores at the 
left, and the San Luis troops at the right. Though Urrea had no 
artillery, he decided to join battle at once. The American wings wer$ 


278 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


first attacked. Morales led a bayonet charge from the left, but this 
was repulsed. Then Urrea in person led a cavalry charge from the 
rear, but was forced to retire. Still a third attack was unsuccessful, 
and Urrea drew off his troops to await the arrival of the artillery, 
placing patrols around the Americans. 

The battle had lasted from three in the afternoon till dark, and 
the Americans had fought with great bravery—a fact which Urrea 
repeatedly mentions in his Diario. Of their number seven had been 
killed and sixty wounded, Fannin and John Sowers Brooks being 
among the number wounded. The American cavalry had escaped 
when first overtaken, though some abandoned their horses and went 
to the aid of their companions. Needless to say, Urrea used their 
horses with which to mount his soldiers. 

Survivors of the massacre picture the night of March 19 as one 
of great horror. The Americans were without lights, water, or pro¬ 
visions. For the most part they spent the night in digging an entrench¬ 
ment and placing their carts and the carcasses of their two horses 
and of several oxen as breastworks. Escape was clearly impossible; 
the Americans were surrounded by the Mexicans; the night was exces¬ 
sively dark; to have made a dash for liberty would have necessitated 
their leaving their wounded at the mercy of the Mexicans, and this 
they would not do. 


( e ) The Surrender of Fannin's Men 

Early next morning Urrea received a fresh supply of ammunition, 
two pieces of artillery and reinforcements. His number was now 
about 1300, while the Americans had possibly something over 200 
fighting men. 1 A few rounds from Urrea’s artillery and a considera¬ 
tion of their plight caused them to deliberate on the question of sur¬ 
render. Their own artillery had been of little use the afternoon 
before; their gunner had been killed; John Sowers Brooks, their chief 
engineer, had been wounded; and in their low position the artillery 
could not be used. The Mexican artillery, in a higher position, showed 
the Americans that only complete annihilation awaited them. They 
had been brave enough to keep the enemy at bay in an open gun 
duel; but in artillery fighting they realized their inferiority. Also, 
without food and water, to continue fighting would be only to postpone 
their fate. 

The Americans knew of the treachery of the Mexicans to King’s 
men; but they had a notion that if the terms of surrender were set 

1 This is an estimate by Bernard, and is probably about 350 in excess of 
the real number of Urrea’s men in the battle. Urrea had at this time his own 
forces of 550 men (Diario, 7) besides the 500 reinforcements of the San Luis 
and Jimenez Battalions from Bexar (Diario, 13). He says that he started in 
pursuit of Fannin with 360 infantry and 80 cavalry, sent back 100 of these, 


GOLIAD 


279 


down in writing, some consideration would be shown the scrap of 
paper. Hence, the officers urged Fannin to make an honorable capitu¬ 
lation, and only on this consideration was he urged by his officers to 
treat. Bernard declares that Fannin held out against his officers, and 
only agreed to raise the white flag when he learned it was their 
unanimous wish. 

That there was a capitulation all the survivors of the massacre 
affirm, for they saw the officers writing; but the exact terms were 
not definitely proved till the original document was found by Professor 
E. C. Barker a few years ago in Mexico City. The American sur¬ 
vivors had almost unanimously declared the terms to be something as 
follows: 

1. That they should lay down their arms and surrender as pris¬ 
oners of war and be treated according to the usage of civilized nations. 

2. That their wounded should be taken back to Goliad and be 
properly attended to. 

3. That all private rights should be respected. 

The real terms of surrender as published in Urrea’s Diario in 1838, 
and confirmed by the original in the Mexican Archives, are as follows: 

Art. 1st. The Mexican troops having placed their artillery at a distance 
of one hundred and seventy paces and having opened fire, we raised a white 
flag and at once Colonels Juan Morales and Mariano Salas came in company 
with Lieutenant Colonel Juan Jose Holsinger of the Engineers, and we pro¬ 
posed to them to surrender ourselves at discretion, to which they agreed. 

Art. 2nd. That the wounded and their commander Fannin should be treated 
with all the consideration possible, since we propose to surrender all our arms. 

Art. 3rd. All the detachment shall be treated as prisoners of war and 
placed at the disposal of the Supreme Government. 

Camp on the Coleto between Guadalupe and La Bahia. March 20, 1836. 

B. C. Wallace (Major), J. M. Chadwick (Adjutant). Approved, J. W. 
Fannin (Commander). 

[Added by Urrea] : When the white flag was raised by the enemy, I 
ordered their leader to be informed that I could have no other agreement than 
that they should surrender at discretion, without any other condition, and this 
was agreed to by the persons stated above; the other petitions which the 
subscribers of this surrender make will not be granted. I told them this, and 
they agreed to it, for I must not, nor can I, grant anything else. 

This, then, means that the Americans surrendered at discretion and 
placed themselves at the disposal of the supreme government. The 
government had decreed that foreigners taken with arms in their hands 
were to be regarded as pirates and executed. Santa Anna had warned 
Urrea that he should comply with this law. It is not likely that Fannin 
was ignorant of this law, and certainly Urrea could make no treaty 
except under it. Urrea declared that the Americans surrendered in 
full confidence that Mexican generosity would not make their sacrifice 

but got 100 reinforcements the next morning. As he used the San Luis and 
Jimenez Battalions in the battle, he probably means to say that he used these 
in addition to the 360 infantry and 80 cavalry, making about 950 in all. 



280 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


fruitless; otherwise, they would have resisted and sold their lives as 
dearly as possible. Holsinger 2 confirms Urrea’s statement that he 
promised that he would use his influence with the supreme government 
to have the law set aside in the case of the Americans, and declares 
that the Americans were assured by the commissioners sent by Urrea 
that the Mexican government had never ordered a man shot who had 
trusted to its clemency. 


(/) The Goliad Massacre 

By March 22, all the Americans 3 had been removed from the 
battlefield to Goliad; on the 24th, Major Miller with 80 men from 
Nashville, who had been captured on landing at Copano, was taken 
there; and on the 26th, Ward with 80 of his men had been sent in 
from Victoria. On March 26, also, Urrea, who was now in Victoria, 
wrote Portilla, whom he had left in command of Goliad, to treat the 
prisoners with consideration, and to employ them in repairing houses 
and erecting quarters. On the same day, also, Portilla received orders 
from Santa Anna to have all the prisoners who had surrendered by 
force of arms to be shot, and gave instructions as to how to proceed 
about it. 

Portilla vacillated all night between these orders, but at daybreak 
on March 27, he determined to obey Santa Anna’s order, since it was 
superior to Urrea’s. His account of how he did this is brutal in its 
conciseness: he gave orders to awaken the prisoners; had Colonel 
Miller’s company separated from the rest; placed the prisoners in 
three divisions under Alcerrica, Balderas, and Ramirez, who had 
orders to shoot them. Then he sent an official account of the affair to 
Santa Anna; also a letter to Urrea, protesting against receiving orders 
as a public executioner, and complaining that he and his Indians were 
doubtless left at Goliad for the purpose of carrying into effect the 
schemes Urrea had in view. 

Fannin, on account of his wound, was not marched out with the 
other Americans. He was unmoved when he heard that he was to 
be killed, but requested that he might not be shot in the head and 
that he might be decently buried. Both these requests were denied 
him: he was shot in the head, and his body was placed with the 
others and burned. 

That Santa Anna alone was to blame for this horrible massacre is 
a well established fact. As head of the government, he was responsible 

2 Holsinger to Wharton, June 3; 1836. Urrea, Diario, 129-31. An English 
translation of this letter, made by Edward Gritten, is in the Lamar Papers. 

Holsinger was a German, but was in command of the engineers in Urrea’s 
army. He was one of the commissioners sent by Urrea to arrange the terms 
of surrender. Later he superintended the receiving of the arms from the 
Americans. 

3 The number was 234. Urrea, Diario, 61. 


GOLIAD 


281 


for the passing of the law that foreigners taken with arms in their 
hands were to be executed. He attempted to justify himself by 
declaring that the prisoners were very embarrassing to the commandant 
at Goliad; that before they had retreated they had set fire to the place, 
and that nothing was left but the church in which to house the Mexican 
sick and wounded; that the prisoners greatly outnumbered the gar¬ 
rison, and had constantly to be watched; that the Mexicans were poorly 
supplied with provisions; and that they were without cavalry to trans¬ 
port the prisoners to Matamoros. 

Colonel Juan Jose Holsinger, in his letter to John A. Wharton 
would have us believe that Urrea did not intercede for Fannin’s men, 
or at least that he did not inform Santa Anna of his personal prom¬ 
ises to Fannin. Urrea vigorously denies this, and cites as proof the 
statement of Caro, in Ver dad era Idea, that when Urrea wrote Santa 
Anna recommending that mercy be shown the Americans, he received 
a vigorous reprimand, in which Santa Anna expressed displeasure that 
Urrea should stain his triumph by a badly misunderstood compassion. 
Urrea also shows that, if we consider the circumstances under which 
Holsinger wrote this letter, we will understand that it was simply to 
save Santa Anna’s life that he wrote it. 


II. Letters from Goliad 
By John Sowers Brooks 

[John Sowers Brooks, the writer of the letters which follow, arrived in 
Texas in December, 1835. He became one of Fannin’s adjutants and was killed 
in the Goliad massacre. These and other letters from Brooks are published 
in the Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, IX, I 57 _20 9-1 


Letter to Miss Mary Ann Brooks 

Fort Defiance, Goliad, Texas, Feb. 25, 1836. 

My dear Sister:—From the hurry of a preparation to march, I 
have stolen a moment to write to you. An express from San Antonio 
de Bexar received here a few moments since, with intelligence that the 
Mexican Army under Santa Anna, were in sight of that place and 
preparing to attack it. He heard the firing of cannon after he had 
gained some distance towards us. He estimated their strength at from 
three to five thousand men. Bexar has a garrison of 156. They have 
retired to the Alamo, determined to hold out to the last and have 
solicited reinforcements from us. We have 420 men here, and have 
been engaged in repairing the Fort, and mounting artillery. Com¬ 
manding Officer, in the field, Gen. Fannin, has made Goliad his Head 
Quarters, from the conviction of its importance, as being advantage¬ 
ously located for a depot of reinforcements, clothing, provisions and 
military stores. It commands the sea coast, particularly Aransas and 


282 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Matagorda Bays,—and consequently the only convenient landings for 
vessels of any tonnage. The only troops in the field at this time are 
volunteers from the United States, and they probably do not exceed 
800, and perhaps one third of them are near the scene of action. He 
was therefore compelled to remain in this place in order to prepare 
it as a depot, and to forward provisions, et cetera. From the want of 
cavalry, we have been unable to obtain any accurate information of 
the enemy’s movements. Thus Bexar has been left exposed and the 
Mexicans availing themselves of the advantages thus unavoidably 
offered them, have marched against it with all their force. With a 
forlorn hope of 320 men, we will start tonight or tomorrow morning 
at the dawn of day in order to relieve the gallant little garrison, who 
have so nobly resolved to sustain themselves until our arrival. Our 
force is small compared with that of the enemy. It is a desperate 
resort, but we hope the God of Battles will be with us—that victory 
will again perch on the bright little banner of Texian liberty and that 
the civic militia, now aroused to a sense of their danger and the 
proximity of their implacable and mercenary foe, will appear in their 
strength, that the young lion will arise in the majesty of his untried 
strength and our youthful Republic make herself worthy of the high 
destiny at which she aims. If by forced marches we can reach Bexar, 
a distance of more than a hundred miles, and cut our way through 
the enemy’s lines to our friends in the Fort, our united force thus 
advantageously posted, may perhaps be sufficient to hold out until the 
militia can be collected to reinforce us. If the militia do not rendezvous 
promptly, I apprehend much. But the sin be upon their own heads. 
We have resolved to do our duty and to perish under the walls of 
the Alamo, if stern necessity requires it. We are but poorly prepared 
to meet the formidable host of Mexicans, arrayed against us. 

I am now acting aid-de-camp to the Commander in chief, having 
resigned my appointment of the Adjutancy to the 1st Regiment. I 
have also been acting as chief engineer to the post and but for this 
occurrence, would have had it in a tolerable state of defense in a 
short time. The ordnance and magazine were also placed under my 
charge. From this circumstance, you will readily and rationally infer, 
that there are but few professional soldiers here, when one of my age 
with but few months’ experience has so many important trusts con¬ 
fided to him. My duties have been arduous in the extreme, having 
besides the above appointments, frequently to drill the Regiment and 
companies, and this must be my excuse for not having written home 
as often as I might have done otherwise. By the way, I have not 
heard from home either by letter or otherwise since I left New York. 
Why have you not written? 

And now my dear sister, I would ask you to look upon my situation 
in its proper light, and to indulge in no unnecessary fears. I am a 
soldier both morrally and physically. Death is one of the chances of 
the game I play and if it falls to my lot, I shall not murmur, and 


GOLIAD 


283 


you should not regret. I shall write to you as soon as some thing 
decissive occurs. We shall probably be attacked by the Mexicans on 
our way to Bexar, and if I should die, my services will entitle me 
to 1800 or more acres of land which will be valuable. It will revert 
to my representatives, and father should claim it. Tell him I owe 
Mr. Hagerty in N. Y. and a portion of it can be applied to the dis¬ 
charge of that debt. 

We will take with us, four pieces of artillery, two sixes and two 
fours.—Now is the time for the people of the U. S. to do some thing 
for Texas. Can nothing be done in Staunton? 

Give my love to all the family, tell mother to remember me, and 
tell them all to write to me. They are calling for me now. In the 

greatest haste, Ever your brother, T ~ „ 

John Sowers Brooks. 


Letter to A. H. Brooks 

Fort Defiance, Goliad, Texas, Feb. 25, 1836, 10 P. M. 
My dear Father:— 

I wrote to Mary Ann today, and as the Express does not leave 
before reveille tomorrow, I thought that I might profitably employ 
the few moments I have obtained in writing to you, for it is possible 
I may never have another opportunity. 

In my letter, I gave a hasty detail of our intended movements and 
the causes which produced them and I would refer you to it, if it has 
reached its destination. 

From information received since the letter above referred to, was 
written, we are induced to believe that the Mexican force at and near 
San Antonio de Bexar does not exceed 3000. The Garrison which 
has been withdrawn from the town to the Alamo, a Fort in the 
suburbs, consists in 156 effective men. They are resolute and have 
determined to die in the ditch rather than dishonor themselves, the 
cause they have espoused, or the Country they represent. 

We will march at the dawn of day tomorrow with 320 men, and 4 
pieces of artillery,—2 sixes and 2 fours. We have no provisions 
scarcely, and many of us are naked and entirely destitute of shoes. 
But something must be done to relieve our Country. We have suf¬ 
fered much and may reasonably anticipate much greater suffering. 
But if we succeed in reaching Bexar, before the Garrison is compelled 
to surrender and are successful in taking the place and its gallant 
defenders, we shall deem ourselves amply repaid for our trials and 
hardships. But if we fail, I fear that our misfortunes will have an 
unhappy influence in prolonging the struggle in which poor Texas is 
engaged. We will leave a Garrison of 100 men with the hope that a 
portion of the Civic Militia who are embodying will be ordered here, 
and the remainder sent to reinforce us. If we are successful, it will 
prove a check to the Mexican army from which it will not readily 


284 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


recover and which will ever after have a salutary influence upon our 
cause. But my dear Father, I frankly confess that without the inter¬ 
position of Providence, we can not rationally anticipate any other 
result to our Quixotic expedition than total defeat. If the Militia 
assemble, and move promptly to our aid, we may be saved. We have 
less than 350 men; the force of the enemy is possibly 3,000—a vast 
disparity. We are almost naked and without provisions and very 
little ammunition. We are undisciplined in a great measure; they are 
regulars, the elite of Santa Anna's army; well fed, well clothed, and 
well appointed and accompanied by a formidable battery of heavy field 
and battering pieces. We have a few pieces but no experienced artil¬ 
lerists and but a few rounds of fixed ammunition, and perhaps less 
of loose powder and balls. We can not therefore, calculate very 
sanguinely upon victory. However, we will do our best, and if we 
perish, Texas and our friends will remember that we have done our 
duty. 

In my letter to sister, I alluded to the possibility of my death, 
not with a view to elicit hers or your sympathy, or to excite any 
unpleasant feelings in my behalf. I owe Mr. Hagerty a small sum 
he furnished me and am desirous of pointing out some mode by which 
it may be repaid, if I should be unfortunate enough to fall. My 
services here will entitle me to 1800 or more acres of land. It will 
revert to my legal representatives, and I hope you will claim it and 
appropriate a sufficient portion of it to that purpose. 

From our information, we are induced to apprehend an attack on 
our march to Bexar by a detachment of the enemy’s cavalry. We 
hope they will not be in sufficient force to retard our march, much 
less defeat us. 

I am at present acting Aid de Camp to the Commander-in-Chief 
and Chief Engineer of the post and master of ordnance. 

It is getting late, I slept but little last night and as we must march 
soon in the morning, I beg you will excuse this hasty scrawl. 

Give my love to mother, Norborne, Mary Ann, Hannah, Henrietta 
and to Richard and his family. My health is good. Farewell! 

Your affectionate son, 

John Sowers Brooks. 

P. S. I have not heard from home since I left. Direct your let¬ 
ters to the care of J. W. Fannin, Jr., Army of Texas, pay the postage 
to New Orleans. I have no money. I should like to have. 

Brooks. 

Do not fail to write me immediately, and send me some money if 
possible. I am very much in want of it, I assure you. The Govern¬ 
ment has obtained a loan and will soon pay us off—when I can pay you. 

Brooks. 


GOLIAD 


285 


Give my respects to all who remember me. Tell the youth of 
Staunton they may now do some thing in the cause of Liberty if 
they will come to Texas. 

Letter to Mrs. Brooks 

Fort Defiance in Goliad, Head Quarters, 
Army of Texas, March 2, 1836. 

My dear Mother: 1 — 


Letter to Miss Mary Ann Brooks 

Fort Defiance, Goliad, Texas. 

My dear Sister:— March 4, 1836. 

Another opportunity of writing to you occurs, and I embrace it 
because they are infrequent, and becoming hourly more so. The 
precarious channel, through which all letters must arrive at or go from 
this place affords, indeed, the only satisfactory explication of your 
mysterious silence; and the belief that yours have been intercepted or 
miscarried, is consoling indeed, for it renders doubtful what, in my 
moments of desperation, I have often feared is certain—that you had 
forgotten your poor, wayward brother. . . . 

Perhaps a brief retrospect of the events of our campaign, up to 
this period, would be interesting to you. On the 24th day of January, 
1836, the Georgia Battalion of Volunteers (of which I was Adjutant), 
consisting of four Companies, sailed from Velasco, at the Mouth of 
the Brazos, in two vessels. Our object was, primarily, to attack and 
take Matamoras, and thus form a point of rendezvous, and concentra¬ 
tion for volunteers from the U. States, for a more extensive invasion 
of Mexico. Our intention was to allow Liberal principles, and sup¬ 
port for the time, the federation of 1824, and thus revolutionize 
Tamaulipas, the greater portion of whose citizens are opposed to Santa 
Ana, and to secure our foot hold in Mexico. The fourth day, we 
debarked at Copano, and after a day’s march, we pitched our tents 
at the Mission of Refugio, and waited for the promised munitions 
and reinforcements. They never arrived. In the mean time, our spy, 
who had preceded us, returned with the intelligence, that the people 
of Tamaulipas were opposed to any severance of the Republican bonds, 
and would not favor our project, if Texas declared itself independent. 
He also informed us, that Santa Ana was concentrating his troops, to 
the number, of from 7 to 12,000 men, at Matamoras, Laredo, Saltillo, 
Monclova, and Monterey, for the purpose of invading Texas, and 
punishing his rebellious subjects, with a war of extermination. We 
retreated to Goliad, and commenced fortifying and preparing for the 

1 For this letter see Chapter XXIII. 


286 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


threatened storm. We have remained here ever since, busily employed, 
in getting in provisions, military stores, picketing, ditching, and mount¬ 
ing cannon for our defense. 

Santa Ana’s army is now in motion, and our almost unprotected 
frontier, is the destined goal of its operations. One of his divisions 
has already attacked Bexar, the town which was surrendered to the 
Americans, on the 18th Dec., 1835, by the Mexican General, Cos, 
which garrison consisted of only 156 Volunteers, who retreated to the 
Alamo, a strong fortress in the suburbs, and still held out, at our 
last intelligence. “Davy Crockett” is with them. The Mexicans 
amounted to 2000. We started with 300 men to their relief, but 
found it impossible to proceed, from the want of horses or oxen, to 
transport our baggage and artillery. While deliberating on what steps 
to take, intelligence reached us that 200 Mexicans, the advance guard 
of the division of their army, which was destined to operate against 
this portion of our frontier, had attacked and totally defeated, Col. 
Johnson and his force of 40 men at San Patricio, a town on the Rio 
de la Neuces, about 60 miles in front of our position. Only five 
escaped, among whom was Col. Johnson and Mr. Toler, a merchant. 
We are in hourly expectation of an attack; but, from the want of 
horses, we are unable to obtain any accurate information of the 
strength or movements of the enemy. We suppose their force to be 
from 1500 to 3000 men. We have but 500—all Volunteers. But we 
are resolved to die, to a man, under the walls we have thrown up, 
rather than surrender to a horde of merciless savages, who have 
declared their determination to adhere to none of the rules of civilized 
war fare; but to murder all Americans, indiscriminately. Capt. Pear¬ 
son and several others were shot down, after they had surrendered 
at San Patricio. This on the part of the enemy, is to be a war of 
extermination, not directed solely against the armed soldiers in the 
field, but against the peaceful citizen, the helpless female, and the 
defenceless infant. They show no quarter; we do not require it; 
and, indeed, both parties seem to have tacitly contracted, that it shall 
neither be asked nor given. Let them pursue their course of ruthless 
cruelty; they will encounter spirits as stern as their own; they will 
find, if retaliation requires it, that we can be as deaf to the calls of 
mercy as they can be. If victory favors us, ample shall be their 
retribution, for the murdered volunteers at San Patricio. 

We have just learned that Col. Grant with 22 men, has been at¬ 
tacked by 200 Mexicans, on the road from San Patricio to Matamoras, 
15 miles from the former place, and his whole party, with the excep¬ 
tion of two who escaped, killed or taken. Col. Grant is a prisoner. 
Up to this time, they have uniformly killed all the Americans they 
take, and it is reasonable therefore, to infer that not one of that ill 
fated party survived. 

We will probably be attacked before I can write you again. The 
advance of the enemy is within 25 miles of us. If we are defeated, 


GOLIAD 


287 


it will be after a hard fight. Tell every one of the family to write 
to me, and mail their letters different days. 

Events are thickening upon us. I will write to you again, the first 
opportunity that occurs. In the mean time write to me by several 
different mails; and if I die, reflect that it will be in a good couse. 

Give my love to all the family. 

Your affectionate brother, 

John Sowers Brooks. 

Direct your letters to John Sowers Brooks, Volunteer Army of 
Texas, to the care of Col. J. W. Fannin, Jr., or to Quintana, Mouth 
of the Brazos, to the care of Messrs. McKinney & Williams. It has 
been four months since I have heard from home. 

On my arrival at Goliad, I was appointed Adjutant of the Post. I 
have since been transferred to the General’s Staff, as Aid-de-Camp. 

I am nearly naked, almost barefooted, and without a cent of money. 
We have had nothing but beef for several days. We suffer much 
and labor hard in repairing the Fort. 

(Endorsed on the back, “Will Mess. McKinney & Williams, please 
forward this letter to U. S. by first opportunity and oblige, J. S. B.” 

Post Marked, New Orleans, Mar. 23. Endorsed, Fort Defiance, 
Mar. 4, 1836.) 

Letter to Mr. James Hagerty, New York, U. S. 

Fort Defiance, Goliad, Texas, March 9, 1836. 

My dear friend:— 

I have written to you several times since my arrival in Texas; 
but, as I have received no answer from you, I presume my letters have 
miscarried. An opportunity now occurs of forwarding to Matagorda, 
whence it will more probably be shipped to New Orleans, than by the 
usual route, now infested by the enemy. 

A brief retrospect of our heretofore bloodless campaign, will per- 
haps, be interesting to you. I write in great haste, and may possibly, 
omit events necessary to elucidate our conduct. Indeed, it is impos¬ 
sible within the compass of a single letter, to give you any idea of 
the manner in which our little army has been influenced by the policies 
of the Country; though most of them are strangers to it, and conse¬ 
quently unable to realize the motives which actuate the different par¬ 
ties.—For Texas is not, as you would probably suppose, united, in 
the great struggle before her. Party spirit has taken a form even 
more malignant than she has assumed in the U. States; and to such 
an extent has domestic cavilling been carried, that the Council have 
deposed, impeached, and arrested the Governor, while he, by an official 
fiat, has dissolved the Council; and thus we see the striking anomaly 


288 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


of two Governors, created by different authorities, ruling in the same 
country. 

But, to return—On the 24th day of January, 1836, the Georgia 
Battalion of Volunteers, in which I held a responsible office, sailed 
from the Brazos, under the Command of J. W. Fannin, Jr. The 
object of this expedition was to take the City of Matamoras, to revo¬ 
lutionize the State of Tamaulipas, to form a nucleus, or point of 
rendezvous for volunteers from the U. States, to harrass the enemy 
at sea, to relieve ourselves from the burden of the war by carrying it 
out of the Country, and to give employment to the volunteers who 
had lately arrived. On the 4th day we arrived at Copano, at the head 
of the Aransasso Bay, where we debarked, and landed our stores, 
munitions, and artillery. After a day’s march, we pitched our tents 
at the Mission of Refugio, in Mr. Power’s grant, and remained for 
a few days, in order to make cartridges and prepare our artillery, 
which was defective, for service. In the mean time, the scout who 
had been sent ahead, returned with information, that Santa Ana had 
already commenced the concentration of his army on our frontiers. 
They were rendezvousing at Matamoras, Monclova, Saltillo, Monterey, 
and Laredo, to the number of from 6 to 10,000 men, and designed 
attacking Bexar and Goliad simultaneously, with two divisions of his 
army, and marching the third between those points to San Felipe, 
where he intended fortifying. We immediately apprised Government 
of these facts, and fell back to Goliad with our small force of 450 
men, and commenced repairing the Fort. Bexar was garrisoned by 
150 or 200 men; and with this handful of 6 or 700 Volunteers, we 
are left by the generous Texians, to roll back the tide of invasion 
from their soil. 

On the 23rd ult. the Mexican advance, reached Bexar, and attacked 
the subsequent morning with 1800 men. The gallant little garrison 
retired to the Alamo, a fortress in the suburbs, resolved to hold out 
to the last. The Mexicans made several assaults, and were repulsed 
with loss at every instance. On the receipt of the intelligence at 
Goliad, we promptly marched with 320 men and four pieces of artil¬ 
lery, to their aid. In marching a few miles, our oxen became weary, 
and we were compelled to halt or leave our baggage and artillery. 
While consulting on what course to pursue, we received news of the 
successive defeats of the parties of Cols. Johnson and Grant, in 
Tamaulipas, and of the approach of the lower division of Santa Ana’s 
army on our position at Goliad. A Council of War was held in the 
bushes, and it was determined to return to the post we had vacated 
in the morning, as its abandonment would leave the road open to the 
settlements, and completely uncover our depot provisions, the only 
one now in Texas, and consequently the main stay of the Army. 

The Mexicans, to the number of 700, are now in San Patricio, 
about 60 miles in front of our position; and another party of 200 
have been discovered within 18 miles of us, between us and Gonzales. 


GOLIAD 


289 


Every thing indicates that an attack will be speedily made upon us. 
Their scouts, well mounted, frequently push up to our walls, and, 
from the want of horses, we are unable to punish them. 

We have again heard from Bexar, Santa Anna has arrived there 
himself, with 3000 men, making his whole force 4800. He has erected 
a battery within 400 yards of the Alamo, and every shot goes through 
it, as the walls are weak. It is feared that Bexar will be taken and 
that the devoted courage of the brave defenders will be of no avail. 

We have had no bread, for several days. I am nearly naked, 
without shoes, and without money. We suffer much, and as soon as 
Bexar falls, we will be surrounded by 6000 infernal Mexicans. But 
we are resolved to die under the walls rather than surrender. 

You shall hear from me again as soon as possible. 

I am acting Aid-de-Camp to the Commander-in-Chief, with the 
rank of Lieutenant. The Express is anxious to start, and I am com¬ 
pelled to close this letter, unfinished. 

Independence has probably been declared. We are in a critical 
situation. I will die like a soldier. 

Farewell, 

John S. Brooks. 

(Endorsed, “Mes. McKinney & Williams will please forward this 
to the U. S. by the first opportunity and oblige, J. S. B.” Also “Goliad, 
Mar. 9, ’36.” Post Marked New Orleans, Mar. 28.) 


Letter to A. H. Brooks 


My dear Father:— 


Fort Defiance, Goliad, Texas, 
March 10, 1836. 


I wrote to Mother and to Mary Ann a few days since; but, as 
the route over which the Government’s courier, who carried the letters, 
must have passed has been infested by advanced parties of the enemy, 
it is possible they have been intercepted; and, as an officer will be 
sent to Matagorda tomorrow, I have concluded to write again. 

In the letters referred to, and some others I have previously writ¬ 
ten, I gave a brief detail of the events of our campaign up to this 
period. As some of these epistles must have reached their destination, 
I will not again trouble you with a narration of incidents, which I 
presume, are familiar to you. 

A party of 70 men, under the joint command of Col’s. Grant and 
Johnson, have been in Tamaulipas, for the purpose of acquiring infor¬ 
mation, as to the designs of the enemy, ever since the fall of Bexar 
in December last. They had taken from 2 to 300 horses, for the use 
of the army; and were gradually retiring on this post, when half the 
party, with Col. Johnson at its head, was attacked by about 200 of 


290 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the enemy, and totally defeated. Six, among whom was their leader, 
escaped. Capt. Pearson, and two others were inhumanly butchered, 
after they had surrendered. They, of course, lost all their horses and 
arms. The party under Col. Grant, were attacked between 8 and 9 
o’clock in the morning. They were bringing on a large herd of horses, 
and in their attempt to save them, and, at the same time, fight the 
enemy, who amounted to 150, they were cut to pieces. Five only 
escaped. Col. Grant was either killed on the ground, or is now a 
prisoner. Scarcely had the intelligence of these disasters to our ad¬ 
vance in Tamaulipas reached us, when we were informed by express, 
that the Mexicans had entered Bexar with an effective force of 1800 
men. The garrison there consisted of 156 Americans, who retreated, 
on the approach of the enemy to the Alamo, a Spanish fortress in the 
neighborhood, which was immediately invested, and has been vigor¬ 
ously besieged up to the date of our latest intelligence. 

Immediately on receipt of the news, we promptly took up the line 
of march, in order to relieve them. After proceeding three miles, 
several of our baggage wagons broke down; and it was found impos¬ 
sible to get the ammunition carts or artillery over the river San 
Antonio. We accordingly halted. During the night our oxen strayed 
off. In the morning a Council of War was convened. While it was 
in session, a courier apprised us, that 650 of the enemy, the same, 
probably, who had defeated Grant and Johnson, had reached San 
Patricio on the Neuces and would attack our depot of provisions on 
the La Baca, and at Matagorda. With these facts before us, it was 
concluded to return to Goliad, and maintain that place, which was 
done. 

Thirty two men have cut their way into the Alamo, with some 
provisions. The enemy have erected a battery of nine pounders within 
400 yards of the Fort, and every shot goes through the walls. A 
large party of the enemy are between this and Bexar, with a design 
of cutting off reinforcements. Another division of 3000 Mexicans 
have arrived at Bexar, making their whole force now there 4800 men. 
The little garrison still holds out against this formidable force. It is 
said that Santa Ana is himself with the army before the Alamo. 

It is said that Santa Ana designs driving all the Americans beyond 
Sabine. We have just been advised that he intends detaching 1000 
men from Bexar, to form a junction with the 650 at San Patricio, and 
then reduce this place. We have 450 men here, and twelve pieces of 
small artillery. We have strengthened the fort very much; and he 
will find it difficult with his 1650 men to drive us from our post. 

We are hourly anticipating an attack, and preparing for it. We 
are short of provisions, and that is now our deadliest foe. Unless we 
are soon supplied, we can not hold out much longer. We have had 
no bread for some time. We suffer much from the want of shoes 
and clothing. 

Excuse this hasty letter. I have just returned from a weary and 


GOLIAD 


291 


unsuccessful march in pursuit of a party of Mexicans, who appeared 
a few miles from this place. 

I have not heard from home since I have been in Texas, and I 
am at a loss to account for your silence. 

The Convention, which met the first of this month, it is rumored, 
have declared Texas independent. No official or authentic informa¬ 
tion, however, has come to hand. 

You shall hear from me again as soon as possible. I am Aid-de- 
Camp to the Commandant here. Farewell. 

Your affectionate son, 

John S. Brooks. 

P. S. I have neither clothes nor money to buy them. The Gov¬ 
ernment furnishes us with nothing,—not even ammunition. I have 
written nearly twenty letters home, all of them unanswered. 

Brooks. 

Give my love to all the family and write. 

(Endorsed “March ioth, 1836, Fort Defiance, Goliad.” Post 
Marked, “New Orleans, April 19.”) 


III. General Urrea’s Account of the Goliad Campaign 

[The selection which follows is from General Jose Urrea’s Diary, translated 
by Carlos E. Castaneda, in The Mexican Side of the Texas Revolution, 223- 
230, 234-237. Urrea published his Diary in 1838.] 

[March ip.] After marching two leagues, I was informed by my 
spies, whose activity is truly marvelous, that we were near the enemy, 
and that it seemed that they were not taking all the force that had 
garrisoned Goliad. I ordered 100 infantry to return, therefore, to 
protect the artillery and munitions which were being brought up, 
and redoubled the vigilance of the rest of my forces. At half past 
one in the afternoon, I overtook the enemy and succeeded in cutting 
off their retreat with our cavalry, just as they were going to enter a 
heavy woods from where it would have been difficult, if not impos¬ 
sible, to dislodge them. They were marching in column formation and 
carried nine pieces of artillery. Seeing themselves forced to fight, 
they decided to make the best of it and awaited our advance with 
firmness, arranging their force in battle formation with the artillery 
in the center. My troops though fatigued by the rapidity of the 
march, were filled with enthusiasm at seeing the enemy, for they 
thought that to overtake them and defeat them was all one. Although 
our force was inferior and we had no artillery, the determination of 
our troops made up the disparity. 

Expecting the artillery and our munitions to reach us soon, agree¬ 
able to instructions given, I decided to engage the enemy at once. 


292 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Our fire was immediately returned by their rifles and cannon. I 
ordered the brave Col. Morales to charge the left with the rifle com¬ 
panies; the grenadiers and the first regiment of San Luis, under my 
immediate command, to charge the right; the remainder of the bat¬ 
talion of Jimenez, under the command of Col. Salas, to form itself 
into a column and charge the front; while the cavalry, commanded 
by Col. Gabriel Nunez, was to surprise the enemy’s rear. These in¬ 
structions having been issued, the orders were immediately carried 
out and a determined charge was made on the right and left flanks. 

In order to obtain a quick victory, I ordered my troops to charge 
with their bayonets at the same time that Col. Morales did likewise 
on the opposite flank; and, according to previous instructions, the 
central column advanced in battle formation, sustaining a steady fire 
in order to detract the attention of the enemy while we surprised the 
flanks. Though our soldiers showed resolution, the enemy was like¬ 
wise unflinching. Thus, without being intimidated by our impetuous 
charge, it manoeuvered in order to meet it; and, assuming a hammer 
formation on the right, they quickly placed three pieces of artillery 
on this side, pouring a deadly shower of shot upon my reduced 
column. A similar movement was executed on the left, while our 
front attack was met with the same courage and coolness. 

Our column was obliged to operate in guerrillas in order to avoid, 
as far as possible, the withering fire of the enemy, who kept up a most 
lively fire, for each one of their soldiers had three and even four 
loaded guns which they could use at the most critical moment. The 
fire of the nine cannon, itself lively and well directed, was impos¬ 
ing enough; but our soldiers were brave to rashness and seemed to 
court death. The enemy put into play all its activity and all the 
means at its command to repel the charge. While defending them¬ 
selves from our determined attack, they built up defences with their 
baggage and wagons, forming a square. It was necessary, therefore, 
for the officers, who vied with each other in daring, to display all 
their courage and the utmost firmness to maintain the soldiers at their 
posts—less than half a rifle shot from the enemy, in the middle of 
an immense plain, with no other parapet than their bare breasts. In 
order to protect our soldiers as far as possible, we ordered them to 
throw themselves on the ground while loading, raising up only to 
fire. In this way the distance between our force and the enemy 
was further decreased. 

Realizing the importance of preventing the enemy from finishing 
its fortifications, especially in the form in which they were doing it, 
I tried to disconcert them with a cavalry charge on their rear, 
and placed myself at the head, convinced that the most eloquent 
language and the most imperious order is personal example. I 
found the enemy prepared to meet us. Although disposing of very 
little time, they had foreseen my operation and received me with a 


GOLIAD 


293 


scorching fire from their cannons and rifles. Our horses were in 
very poor condition and ill-suited for the purpose, but the circum¬ 
stances were urgent and extraordinary efforts were necessary. My 
efforts, however, were all in vain, for after repeatedly trying to 
make the dragoons effect an opening in the enemy’s ranks, I was 
forced to retire—not without indignation. I placed the cavalry in 
a position where it could continuously threaten the enemy, avoiding, 
as far as possible, their fire. 

Seeing that our artillery and munitions did not arrive, my anxiety 
was great. In the midst of our trials and in proportion as they in¬ 
creased I cast furtive glances towards the point by which they were 
to come. But I saw no signs to ease my anxiety, for not even those 
that I had sent to rush our munitions returned. The sun was going 
down and our munitions would soon give out. They were exhausted 
sooner than I expected. Though I had given instructions for the 
infantry to be provided with four rounds to the man, this order had 
been neglected in part under the frivolous pretext of lightening their 
load. They had counted on the early arrival of what was coming up 
on our rear, for when we left the camp at Manahuilla our ammuni¬ 
tion was being loaded. The party conducting it, however, lost its 
way and did not arrive until the following day. 

I decided to make a new and simultaneous charge on all fronts to 
see if I could disconcert the enemy before the sad moment arrived 
when we would be entirely without munitions. I gave the necessary 
orders and, as the bugler gave the signal agreed upon, all our forces 
advanced with firm step and in the best order. I placed myself again 
at the head of the cavalry and led the charge on one of the fronts. 
All our troops advanced to within fifty and even forty paces from 
the square. So brave an effort on the part of our courageous soldiers 
deserved to have been crowned with victory; but fortune refused to 
favor us. The enemy redoubled its resistance with new vigor. They 
placed their artillery on the corners, flanking, in this way, our weakened 
columns. The fire from the cannon, as well as from the rifles, was 
very lively, making itself all the more noticeable in proportion as ours 
died out for lack of ammunition. In these circumstances, I ordered 
all our infantry to fix bayonets and to maintain a slow fire with 
whatever powder remained. 

For almost an hour, this unequal contest was kept up, then I 
finally gave the order to retire, menacing the enemy with our cavalry, 
divided in two wings, in order to allow the infantry to execute the 
movement. Our forces gathered in orderly fashion at the designated 
point of reunion. I joined them there and addressed them in terms 
suited to the occasion, but the troops needed no exhortations, for 
far from being discouraged at seeing their efforts frustrated, they 
were burning with desire to undertake a new bayonet charge. After 
so many hardships, a new attempt, besides being dangerous, was in- 


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advisable. I concluded by saying to the soldiers just as the day closed, 
“Let us gather our forces, let us wait for our ammunition and artil¬ 
lery, let us watch the enemy during the night, and tomorrow I shall 
lead you to victory. You do not need your cartridges, for you have 
your bayonets, and your courage is boundless. The enemy is terrified 
and will not be able to resist any longer the charge of such brave 
Mexicans. I promise you a complete victory.” 

The soldiers were satisfied and filled with pride. I placed the 
infantry a little more than 200 paces from the enemy, protected from 
their rifles by a gentle slope. I detailed cavalry and infantry pickets 
to points from which they could observe the enemy. I moved the 
wounded to the woods which the enemy had tried to take possession 
of when I overtook it, and which was situated to the rear of our 
infantry. During the night I closed the circle formed by our advance 
guards and moved our scouts forward until they could observe the 
slightest movement in the other camp. 

The enemy spent the night digging a ditch all around the square. 
My aides, Lieutenant-Colonel Angel Miramon and Pedro Pablo 
Ferino, Captain Mariano Odriosola, and the militia captain, Jose de 
la Luz Gonzales—were with me, all harrassing the enemy and keeping 
it awake with false bugle calls. I also visited our outposts. The 
enemy’s cavalry, which was small in number, had escaped the moment 
we overtook them, thanks to their good horses. Some there were who, 
choosing the fate of their brave companions, dismounted and aban¬ 
doned their horses. I took advantage of this to replace the worst 
mounts of our dragoons. 

[March 20.] At daybreak I inspected the position of the enemy, 
which I found to be the same as that of the day before, with the 
exception of the trenches formed by their baggage and wagons, now 
reenforced by the piling up of the dead horses and oxen, and by 
the digging of a ditch. 

I issued orders for the battalion of Jimenez to take its position 
in battle formation; the rifle companies were to advance along the 
open country; and the cavalry, in two wings, was to charge both 
flanks. 

The troops having taken up their respective positions, rations were 
issued consisting of hard tack and roast meat. The latter was fur¬ 
nished by the teams of oxen that had been taken from the enemy 
the night before. Those that remained to the enemy were killed by 
sharpshooters detailed for the purpose. The day before, some of the 
infantry had taken cartridges belonging to the cavalry and as a result 
some of the rifles were loaded but they were fixed on this day. 

At half past six in the morning the ammunition arrived, which, 
as stated before, had been lost the day before; and although more 
had been ordered from Colonel Garay, this had not arrived up to 
this time. One hundred infantry, two four-pounders (not a twelve- 


GOLIAD 


295 


pounder), and a howitzer were added to my force. I placed these 
as a battery about 160 paces from the enemy protected by the rifle 
companies. I ordered the rest of the infantry to form a column that 
was to advance along the left of our battery when it opened fire. 
As soon as we did this and began our movement as planned, the 
enemy, without answering our fire, raised a white flag. I immedi¬ 
ately ordered my battery to cease firing and instructed Lieut. Col. 
Morales, Captain Juan Jose Holzinger, and my aide, Jose de la Luz 
Gonzalez to approach the enemy and ascertain its purpose. The first 
of these returned soon after, stating that they wished to capitulate. 
My reply restricted itself to stating that I could not accept any terms 
except an unconditional surrender. Messrs. Morales and Salas pro¬ 
ceeded to tell this to the commissioners of the enemy who had already 
come out from their trenches. Several communications passed be¬ 
tween us; and, desirous of putting an end to the negotiations, I went 
over to the enemy’s camp and explained to their leader the impos¬ 
sibility in which I found myself of granting other terms than an 
unconditional surrender as proposed, in view of which fact I refused 
to subscribe to the capitulation submitted consisting of three articles. 
Addressing myself to Fannin and his companions in the presence of 
Messrs. Morales, Salas, Holzinger and others I said conclusively, “If 
you gentlemen wish to surrender at discretion, the matter is ended, 
otherwise I shall return to my camp and renew the attack.” 

In spite of the regret I felt in making such a reply, and in spite of 
my great desire of offering them guarantees as humanity dictated, 
this was beyond my authority. Had I been in a position to do so, 
I would have at least guaranteed them their life. Fannin was a gentle¬ 
man, a man of courage, a quality which makes us soldiers esteem each 
other mutually. His manners captivated my affection, and if it had 
been in my hand to save him, together with his companions, I would 
have gladly done so. All I could do was to offer him to use my 
influence with the general-in-chief, which I did from the Guada¬ 
lupe. 

After my ultimatum, the leaders of the enemy had a conference 
among themselves and the result of the conference was their sur¬ 
render according to the terms proposed. They immediately ordered 
their troops to come out of their intrenchments and to assume a parade 
formation. Nine pieces of artillery, three flags, more than a thousand 
rifles, many good pistols, guns, daggers, lots of ammunition, several 
wagons, and about 400 prisoners fell into the hands of our troops. 
There were ninety-seven wounded, Fannin and several others of the 
leaders among them. 

I gave orders for all the baggage to be taken up, the prisoners to 
be escorted to Goliad by 200 infantry, and the wounded who were 
unable to walk to be carried in the carts or wagons taken from the 
enemy. They had lost 27 killed the day before. I lost 11 killed, and 


296 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


49 soldiers and five officers were wounded. Captain Jose Maria Bal¬ 
lesteros was seriously injured. 

Right on the battlefield, I wrote a note to Colonel Garay telling 
him of the outcome and asking him to make a report to the general- 
in-chief, for it was impossible for me to do it at the time because I 
was marching to Guadalupe Victoria without stopping to rest. 

Through a dispatch from Colonel Garay, I learned that he had 
taken possession of Goliad where he had found eight pieces af artillery 
which the enemy had been unable to take with them. When he took 
possession, the houses of the city were still burning, having been set 
on fire by the enemy before it retreated. Combustible materials were 
left to prolong the fire, and very few houses were saved. 

According to papers taken from Fannin he had called for reen¬ 
forcements to come to his help and there were good reasons to believe 
that the forces dispersed at Refugio might make their way to Victoria. 
I left my instructions for Colonel Morales to conduct all the arma¬ 
ment and war materials taken from the enemy to Goliad. With the 
greater part of the infantry, one cannon, and all the cavalry available, 
I started for Victoria in order to occupy it and the Guadalupe before 
the enemy did so. I spent the night in the ranch of Coleto, ten miles 
distant from that place. . . . 

On the 27th, between nine and ten in the morning, I received a 
communication from Lieutenant-Colonel Portilla, military command¬ 
ant of that point [Goliad], telling me that he had received orders 
from His Excellency, the general-in-chief, to shoot all the prisoners 
and that he was making preparations to carry out the order. 

This order was received by Portilla at seven in the evening of the 
26th, and although he notified me of the fact on that same date, his 
communication did not reach me until after the execution had been 
carried out. All the members of my division were distressed to hear 
this news, and I no less, being as sensitive as my companions, who 
will bear testimony of my excessive grief. Let a single one of them 
deny this fact! More than 150 prisoners who were with me escaped 
this terrible fate; also those who surrendered at Copano and the 
surgeons and hospital attendants were spared. Those which I kept, 
were very useful to me as sappers. 

I have come to an incident that has attracted the attention of 
foreigners and nationals more than any other and for which there 
have not been lacking those who would hold me responsible, although 
my conduct in the affair was straightforward and unequivocal. The 
orders of the general-in-chief with regard to the fate decreed for 
prisoners were very emphatic. These orders always seemed to me 
harsh, but they were the inevitable result of the barbarous and in¬ 
human decree which declared outlaws those whom it wished to con¬ 
vert into citizens of the republic. Strange inconsistency, in keeping 
with the confusion that characterized the times! 


GOLIAD 


297 


I wished to elude these orders as far as possible without compro¬ 
mising my personal responsibility; and, with this object in view, I issued 
several orders to Lieutenant-Colonel Portilla, instructing him to use 
the prisoners for the rebuilding of Goliad. From this time on, I 
decided to increase the number of the prisoners there in the hope 
that their very number would save them, for I never thought that the 
horrible spectacle of that massacre could take place in cold blood and 
without immediate urgency, a deed proscribed by the laws of war and 
condemned by the civilization of our country. It was painful to me, 
also, that so many brave men should thus be sacrificed, particularly 
the much esteemed and fearless Fannin. They doubtless surrendered 
confident that Mexican generosity would not make their sacrifice use¬ 
less, for under any other circumstances they would have sold their 
lives dearly, fighting to the last. 

I had due regard for the motives that induced them to surrender, 
and for this reason I used my influence with the general-in-chief to 
save them, if possible, from being butchered, particularly Fannin. I 
obtained from His Excellency only a severe reply, repeating his previ¬ 
ous order, doubtless dictated by cruel necessity. Fearing, no doubt, 
that I might compromise him with my disobedience and expose him 
to the accusations of his enemies, he transmitted his instructions 
directly to the commandant at Goliad, inserting a copy of the order 
to me. . . . Even after this lamentable event, I still received a letter 
of the general-in-chief, dated on the 26th, saying: 

“I say nothing regarding the prisoners, for 1 have already stated 
what their fate shall he when taken with arms in their hands.” 

In view of the facts presented, and keeping in mind that while 
that tragic scene was being enacted in Goliad I was in Guadalupe 
Victoria, where I received news of it several hours after the execution, 
what could I do to prevent it, especially if the orders were transmitted 
directly to that place? This is to demand the impossible, and had I 
been in a position to disregard the order it would have been a violent 
act of insubordination. 

If they wish to argue that it was in my hand to have guaranteed 
the lives of those unfortunates by granting them a capitulation when 
they surrendered at Perdido, I will reply that it was not in my power 
to do it, that it was not honorable, either to the arms of the nation 
or to myself, to have done so. Had I granted them terms, I would 
then have laid myself open to a trial by a council of war, for my 
force being superior to that of the enemy on the 20th and my posi¬ 
tion more advantageous, I could not admit any proposals except a 
surrender at discretion, my duty being to continue fighting, leaving the 
outcome to fate. I believe that I acted in accordance with my duty 
and I could not do otherwise. Those who assert that I offered guaran¬ 
tees to those who surrendered, speak without knowledge of the facts. 


CHAPTER XXVI 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 

I. General Houston’s Retreat; Battle of San Jacinto; 

Close of the War 

By Dudley G. Wooten 

[Chapter XIV of A Complete History of Texas for Schools and Colleges. 
Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapter XVIII; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School 
History of Texas, 130-139; “The San Jacinto Campaign,” in Quarterly of the 
Texas State Historical Association, IV, 237-345.] 

After the barbarities at San Antonio and Goliad, Santa Anna 
seemed to think that he had practically conquered Texas; and that 
he had only to complete the subjugation by easy stages. He divided 
his army into three columns. The first, under Gaona, was to march 
to Nacogdoches by the old Comanche trail and the upper crossing 
of the Trinity; the second, under Sesma, was to advance to Bastrop 
on the Colorado, and thence to San Felipe; and the third, under Urrea, 
after scouring the country between Victoria and Galveston, was 
ordered to cross the Colorado at Matagorda and march to Brazoria. 
The point of concentration of the second and third columns was evi¬ 
dently at the mouth of the Brazos, or perhaps at Anahuac, whence 
it was expected the Mexican president and his victorious troops could 
embark for Vera Cruz. Santa Anna himself was to personally direct 
the operations of the army of occupation, and for that purpose he 
set out with Filisola from Bexar, on March 31, accompanied by two 
battalions and five pieces of artillery, to join Sesma’s column. 

Meanwhile, General Houston left Gonzales in flames, on the night 
of March 13, with about three hundred men and a train of fleeing 
and homeless women and children. The weather was wretched; 
the rain poured in torrents, the roads were quagmires, the prairies 
were trackless seas of water, the streams were swollen and swift, and 
the dull and lowering skies covered everything like a pall of gloom 
and despair. The “Runaway Scrape” had begun in earnest, and the 
frightened colonists, seeing in Houston’s retreat and the removal of 
the government to Harrisburg the sure signs of Mexican conquest of 
the whole country, fled in wild confusion, spreading dismay and dread 
everywhere they came. The wretchedness and desperation of those 
times were frightful, and the women and children suffered most. The 

298 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


299 


greatest terror was caused by some cowardly deserters, who left the 
army and ran through the country, even to Eastern Texas, circulating 
the most outrageous accounts of the size of Santa Anna’s forces and 
the retreat of the Texan troops. 

Houston reached Burnham’s Crossing on the Colorado, near the 
present town of Columbus, on March 17, and at once sent William T. 
Austin to the mouth of the Brazos for artillery. It was his purpose 
to make the Colorado his line of defence, expecting reinforcements 
from Eastern Texas and some news of Fannin. On the 19th, Houston 
crossed to the east bank of the river and marched down stream a 
few miles to Beason’s Crossing, where he remained until the 26th. 
On the day the Texans left Burnham’s, Sesma and Woll reached the 
Colorado with about seven hundred men, and stopped on the west 
side two miles above Beason’s. Houston then had about twelve hun¬ 
dred men and could have easily defeated Sesma, but he waited for 
his artillery and for information from Goliad. On the 25th the story 
of the battle of the Coleto reached the Colorado, and that event had 
left Urrea free to join Sesma or to march to the rear of the Texan 
army by a flank movement lower down the river. A battle with 
Sesma at that point would also no doubt have concentrated the entire 
Mexican force on the Colorado, and this would have brought on the 
decisive struggle farther from the base of supplies and troops in the 
settlements of the east than was deemed prudent. A victory would 
not have been final and a defeat would have been destructive. At 
any rate, for these or other reasons, General Houston decided to 
retire to the Brazos, and he began his retreat on the evening of March 
26. His action provoked great criticism and almost mutiny in his 
army. The soldiers were anxious to fight, and they knew they could 
whip the enemy just in front of them, and to fall back under the 
circumstances was considered by many to be the height of folly, not 
to say cowardice. Some of the officers shared this feeling, notably 
Captains Mosely Baker and Wylie Martin, who then and afterwards 
were unsparing in their condemnation of General Houston. But he 
pursued his own course, reaching the Brazos at San Felipe on the 
27th. From there he marched up the river, and this strange and un¬ 
explained movement excited open rebellion on the part of Baker and 
Martin, and they refused to go. Baker, with one hundred and twenty 
men, stayed at San Felipe, while Martin took his company below to 
guard the crossing at Fort Bend. 

The rains and floods continued, and the experiences of the troops 
in the Brazos bottoms were dreary indeed. Houston reached Groce’s 
Ferry, and remained there and at Donoho’s both near the present town 
of Hempstead, until April 14. On March 29, Captain Baker had 
burned the town of San Felipe, as he always claimed, by Houston’s 
orders. In the first days of April, Vice-President Zavala and Secre¬ 
tary of War Rusk joined the army. 


300 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


While the Texans were thus scattered up and down the Brazos, 
Santa Anna was gathering all his forces towards the same locality. 
He countermanded Gaona’s march to Nacogdoches and directed him 
to join Sesma, who had advanced from the Colorado to San Felipe. 
Gaona reached the latter place on April 17, having been lost in com¬ 
ing from Bastrop. Urrea had also been ordered to come from west 
of the Colorado to join his forces with Sesma, Gaona, Tolsa, and 
Woll on the Brazos, where a final victory was expected. But when 
Santa Anna reached San Felipe in person on April 7 > and found that 
Houston had gone up the river, he thought the Texan army had con¬ 
cluded to get out of his way and give him free course to overrun the 
country. He sent word to Urrea to proceed on his original route to 
Matagorda, and, leaving Sesma to await Gaona’s delayed arrival, he 
took about one thousand men and one cannon and tried to cross the 
Brazos. Baker was still at San Felipe and gallantly disputed tfie 
passage, so that Santa Anna went below and effected a crossing at 
Fort Bend, in spite of Martin’s defence there. Pushing on down 
the river and through the bottoms, he reached Harrisburg on the 15th, 
whence the government had barely escaped towards Galveston Island. 
He burned the town on the 16th, and marched to the town of New 
Washington, on Galveston Bay, where President Burnet and family 
were just leaving in a boat in full view of the enemy, and escaped 
unharmed because Almonte would not permit the soldiers to fire on 
account of the ladies. 

Learning of Santa Anna’s movements from his scouts, on the 14th 
Houston left Donoho’s to follow him. Baker had rejoined the army, 
but Martin’s conduct was such that he was sent to the Trinity to 
guard the families there against Indians. It was just as the little 
army was leaving the Brazos that there came to them two cannon, 
the first artillery they had possessed in this campaign,—the generous 
gift of the citizens of Cincinnati,—known afterwards as the “Twin 
Sisters,” and used effectively at San Jacinto. Santa Anna was now 
separated from his army, and had placed himself in a trap by entering 
the narrow peninsula below Harrisburg, into which the Texan army 
now hurried to catch and hold him fast. 

Buffalo Bayou was reached on the 18th. Deaf Smith brought in 
a captured courier with despatches, from which it was rendered cer¬ 
tain that Santa Anna was in front of them. Houston made the men 
a speech which set them wild with enthusiasm and filled their souls 
with righteous vengeance, as he bade them “Remember the Alamo! 
Remember Goliad!” 

On the 19th, by rafts and in rickety boats, the army was crossed 
over the Bayou two miles below Harrisburg, marched nearly all night, 
and at sunrise on the 20th they were halted on the borders of the 
heroic field of San Jacinto. The scene of this encampment was pictur¬ 
esque and beautiful. In the rear lay the deep and sluggish waters of 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


301 


Buffalo Bayou, skirted by groves of live-oaks, whose vivid green was 
sobered by the soft gray moss that hung in festoons from the giant 
trunks and spreading limbs; in front, for two miles, stretched the 
rolling surface of a fertile prairie, covered with tall, waving grass, and 
interspersed with small clumps of trees; while beyond this lay the 
Gulf marshes of the San Jacinto Bay, treacherous and miry, and cov¬ 
ered with a thick growth of rank verdure and swampy timber. The 
wet and late spring was now ripening into early summer, the atmos¬ 
phere was soft and balmy, the trees and grass were fresh and fragrant, 
and the whole scene was full of those sights and sounds that make life 
sweet and hope strong in human breasts. Almost immediately in front 
of the Texan camp there were two small groves of live-oaks, a few hun¬ 
dred yards distant; while the whole ground in front for a length of five 
hundred yards rose above the level of the camp, and to the top of 
this rise there ran a skirt of timber from the Bayou, about midway, 
reaching to near the top where the level of the prairie began. 

Santa Anna was then at New Washington on the upper arm of 
Galveston Bay, and his route of escape by Lynch’s Ferry would neces¬ 
sarily bring him past the Texan camp. The Mexicans proceeded to¬ 
wards the Ferry on the way to Anahuac, on the 20th, and coming 
upon a part of the Texan camp soon afterwards, a sharp skirmish 
ensued, after which the enemy withdrew towards the San Jacinto and 
camped. In the afternoon, Colonel Sidney Sherman, with a small 
force of cavalry, went out to reconnoitre, and became engaged with 
the Mexican infantry, which for a while seemed about to develop 
into a battle, but the Texans withdrew successfully. In this action 
Mirabeau B. Lamar first displayed his bravery and skill, which re¬ 
sulted in his being placed in command of the cavalry next day. The 
Mexican army spent the night in extending their lines and erecting 
fortifications of packs and baggage, with an opening in the centre for 
the artillery. 

Nothing occurred on the 21st until the afternoon. It was a bright 
and beautiful day, and the two armies lay in expectant impatience 
waiting for the result. At nine o’clock in the morning, General Cos 
arrived from the Brazos, bringing to Santa Anna five hundred of 
Sesma’s choice troops, which increased the Mexican force to about 
fifteen hundred men. 1 They came by Vince's bridge, over an arm of 
the Bayou by that name, and Houston at once sent Deaf Smith to 
destroy the bridge, so as to prevent any further reinforcements from 
that direction, or the escape of the enemy by that route. At half-past 
three o’clock in the afternoon, General Houston paraded his troops in 
their position, and arranged to attack the Mexican camp. The location 
of the Texan camp, with the protection given by the timber and the 
nature of the ground as before described, enabled Houston to make 

1 Mexican reports agree that Santa Anna’s original force was 750 men and 
that Cos brought to San Jacinto 400 reinforcements. 


302 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


his dispositions for the attack without being seen by the enemy. He 
divided his army into four divisions. On the extreme right the cav¬ 
alry was placed, under command of Colonel Lamar; next towards 
the left came the infantry, under Millard; then the “Twin Sisters,” 
under Hockley; Colonel Burleson with the first regiment occupied 
the centre; and the second regiment, under Sidney Sherman, formed 
the left wing. The troops advanced to the edge of the projecting neck 
of timber at the top of the rise in front of their camps, while the 
cavalry went to the front to draw the attention of the enemy. Santa 
Anna’s cavalry was on his left wing, his infantry and artillery in the 
centre, behind fortifications of boxes and baggage, while his extreme 
right had been extended so as to reach the timber along the San 
Jacinto. 

The Texan army had no band, its only martial music being a drum 
and fife, and to the air of “Will you come to the bower?” it formed 
its line of battle. At four o’clock the command “Forward” was given 
along the whole line. The men advanced rapidly, and Houston had 
difficulty in making them hold their fire until near enough to do execu¬ 
tion. When at point-blank range, the two cannon were wheeled, and 
poured their contents into the barricades of the Mexican centre, while 
the Texan soldiers dashed headlong upon the startled camp, deliver¬ 
ing a destructive volley at close quarters. Santa Anna’s army seemed 
to be taken by surprise. He himself was asleep in his tent, and the 
soldiers were lying about in confusion. But when those terrible words 
—“Remember Goliad! Remember the Alamo!”—smote on their ears, 
they endeavored to form in line and stem the Texan charge. It was 
useless. Castrillon was shot dead while trying to rally his men. Santa 
Anna in terrified haste mounted a swift horse and fled towards Vince’s 
bridge, now destroyed. The Texans were too eager to reload often, 
and, in their furious haste to wreak vengeance for past outrages, they 
clubbed their muskets and drew their bowie knives. At first no quar¬ 
ter was given. The rout was complete and the slaughter terrific. 
The intensity of the rage and violence of the victorious colonists were 
something fearful. After the battle, many dead Mexicans were found 
into whose heads the heavy knives had been struck with such force 
as to shatter their skulls like panes of glass. The few Texans who 
were injured received their wounds from the first scattering volley, 
fired by the enemy as the barricades were reached and overthrown. 

The fugitives ran in wild terror over the prairie and into the boggy 
marshes of the San Jacinto, and were pursued and killed or driven 
into the mud and water and drowned. In thirty minutes it was all 
over. The inhuman butchery of Travis, Bowie, Crockett, Ward, and 
Fannin had been terribly avenged, but not without regard to the 
usages of civilized war. Almonte rallied about four hundred men and 
formally surrendered, their lives and rights as prisoners being re¬ 
spected. But six hundred and thirty Mexicans lay dead on the field, 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


303 


two hundred and eight were wounded, and seven hundred and thirty 
prisoners were taken, a very few having escaped, most of whom were 
afterwards captured, including Generals Santa Anna and Cos, Colonel 
Almonte, and several other officers. Large quantities of arms, army 
stores, camp equipage and mules and horses were also taken, and 
eighteen thousand one hundred and eighty-four dollars in money, 
three thousand dollars of which were at once voted to the navy. The 
number of men engaged on the Texan side in the battle of San Jacinto 
was seven hundred and forty-three, and their loss was six killed and 
twenty-five wounded. General Houston was painfully and seriously 
wounded, his ankle being shattered by a ball in the first volley fired 
by the Mexicans. That night was one of unbounded joy and uproar¬ 
ious celebration. The men were simply wild with the intoxication of 
victory and the sense of freedom at last gained, after so much suffer¬ 
ing, such tragic losses, such sickening suspense, and ofttimes despair. 

Next day, James A. Sylvester, a sergeant in Wood’s company, 
with six others, was scouting for prisoners on Vince’s Bayou. Syl¬ 
vester, while separated from the others, came on a man concealed in 
the tall grass. He was dressed like a common soldier, but wore a 
fine linen shirt with studs in the bosom, which convinced Sylvester 
that he was in disguise. When the others came up, they started to 
camp with the prisoner, a distance of eight miles, the captive walking 
part of the way and riding behind Joel W. Robinson the remainder. 
When they reached the Texan camp, Sylvester conducted the strange 
man to where General Houston was lying under a tree, talking with 
General Rusk. As the party passed some Mexican prisoners, the latter 
exclaimed in Spanish, “The President,” “General Santa Anna.” This 
was the first intimation of his identity. As soon as Sylvester reached 
Houston and Rusk, Santa Anna stepped forward, and with dignity 
stated his name and rank, and demanded the treatment of a prisoner 
of war. A conversation of nearly two hours ensued. At first Moses 
Austin Bryan, a youth about grown, acted as interpreter; then Gen¬ 
eral John A. Wharton and Vice-President Zavala came up, and the 
latter interpreted for a while, when General Rusk asked Santa Anna 
if he would like to have Almonte sent for, to which the prisoner gladly 
assented, and Almonte translated the greater part of the interview. 
After the first exchange of courtesies between Houston and Santa 
Anna, General Rusk did most of the talking on the part of the Texans. 
A warm discussion was had between him and the Mexican commander 
as to the massacre of Fannin’s men, the responsibility for which Santa 
Anna denied, but did not dispute Urrea’s treaty with Fannin. At last 
Santa Anna said he wanted to end the war and would order Filisola 
to retire from Texas with the army, to which Rusk replied that Filisola 
would not obey him. The prisoner said his officers and men would 
obey any order he might issue. “Then,” said Rusk, “order them to 
surrender.” With great dignity and spirit Santa Anna responded: “I 


304 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


am but a single Mexican, and you can do with me as you please; but 
I will do nothing that would be disgraceful to me or my nation.” The 
captive president was much exhausted, mentally and physically, and 
asked for opium, which was given him. He finally addressed a note 
to General Filisola, directing him to retire to San Antonio, and to 
order Gaona to do the same, while Urrea should retreat to Victoria, 
and all hostilities should be suspended until further orders, pending 
an armistice which had been agreed upon between him and Generals 
Rusk and Houston. These orders were at once sent off to the Mex¬ 
ican commander, and the war practically ceased. 

As soon as the news of the victory reached Galveston Island, Pres¬ 
ident Burnet and his Cabinet came to the camp on the San Jacinto, 
reaching there April 28. The outline of a treaty of peace had already 
been drawn up by Rusk and Houston, and was submitted to Burnet. 
On May 5, General Houston was granted leave of absence to go to 
New Orleans for treatment of his wound, and Rusk was appointed 
to the command of the army, while Colonel M. B. Lamar was made 
secretary of war. Lamar and the secretary of the navy, Robert Pot¬ 
ter, were opposed to treating with Santa Anna, holding him to be a 
miscreant outside the pale of civilized warfare, and entitled only to 
be shot as a murderer. A violent controversy arose as to the standing 
and treatment to be accorded the prisoner, which did not end without 
further serious trouble extending over several months. But on May 
14, 1836, a treaty was finally signed between Santa Anna and David G. 
Burnet, as presidents of their respective republics, by the terms of 
which Santa Anna pledged himself never again to take up arms 
against Texas, and to use his influence to end the war; all hostilities 
should cease on land and water, and the Mexican troops must immedi¬ 
ately evacuate Texas; all property should be respected, captured prop¬ 
erty to be restored; and all prisoners held by the Mexicans must be 
exchanged for an equal number of Mexicans held by the Texans. On 
the same date a secret treaty was made, by which Santa Anna was 
to use all his influence in Mexico to secure a recognition of Texan 
independence and the establishment of the boundary at the Rio Grande. 
The government ad interim had established itself at Velasco on May 
8, and the treaties were executed at that port. The Mexican army, 
amounting in all to about seven thousand troops, continued its retreat 
to the Rio Grande, and in the early part of June they all retired be¬ 
yond that river. 

Meanwhile, great numbers of volunteers were constantly ar¬ 
riving from the United States, and the enthusiasm produced by the 
victory of San Jacinto brought troops from Eastern Texas; so, that 
when the enemy’s last column crossed into Mexico, there were enough 
men in the recruited Texan army to have driven out the invaders had 
they delayed their departure. 

In following the exciting operations of the army on land in the 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


305 


campaign of 1835-36, it must not be forgotten that Texas also had 
a small and efficient navy in the Gulf. Early in the year 1836, the 
government succeeded in procuring three armed vessels,—the Invin¬ 
cible, the Brutus, and the Independence-, —which did valuable service 
in destroying Mexican commerce and securing supplies for the army. 
Other small vessels were afterwards added, and the Texan navy was 
an important factor in some of the events that followed under the 
Republic. 

Having declared and achieved by the test of heroic battle her 
sovereign independence, the new Republic prepared to assume her 
place among the nations of the world, and to maintain a government 
suited to the needs and capacities of her great territory and her grow¬ 
ing population. 

II. Houston’s Report of the Battle of San Jacinto 

Headquarters of the Army, 

San Jacinto, April 25, 1836. 

To His Excellency David G. Burnet, President of the Republic of 
Texas. 

Sir: I regret extremely that my situation, since the battle of 
the 21 st, has been such as to prevent my rendering you my official 
report of the same, previous to this time. 

I have the honor to inform you, that on the evening of the 18th 
inst., after a forced march of fifty-five miles, which was effected in 
two days and a half, the army arrived opposite Harrisburg. That 
evening a courier of the enemy was taken, from whom I learned that 
General Santa Anna, with one division of choice troops, had marched 
in the direction of Lynch’s Ferry on the San Jacinto, burning Harris¬ 
burg as he passed down. The army was ordered to be in readiness 
to march early on the next morning. The main body effected a cross¬ 
ing over Buffalo bayou, below Harrisburg, on the morning of the 19th, 
having left the baggage, the sick, and a sufficient camp guard in the 
rear. We continued the march throughout the night, making but one 
halt in the prairie for a short time, and without refreshments. At 
daylight we resumed the line of march, and in a short distance our 
scouts encountered those of the enemy, and we received information 
that General Santa Anna was at New Washington, and would that day 
take up the line of march for Anahuac, crossing at Lynch’s Ferry. 
The Texan army halted within half a mile of the ferry in some timber 
and were engaged in slaughtering beeves, when the army of Santa 
Anna was discovered to be approaching in battle array, having been 
encamped at Clopper’s point, eight miles below. Disposition was im¬ 
mediately made of our forces, and preparation for his reception. He 
took position with his infantry and artillery in the center, occupying 


306 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


an island of timber, his cavalry covering the left flank. The artillery, 
consisting of one double fortified medium brass twelve-pounder, then 
opened on our encampment. The infantry, in column, advanced with 
the design of charging our lines, but were repulsed by a discharge 
of grape and canister from our artillery, consisting of two six-pound¬ 
ers. The enemy had occupied a piece of timber within rifle shot of 
the left wing of our army, from which an occasional interchange of 
small arms took place between the troops, until the enemy withdrew 
to a position on the bank of the San Jacinto, about three-quarters of 
a mile from our encampment, and commenced fortifications. A short 
time before sunset, our mounted men, about eighty-five in number, 
under the special command of Colonel Sherman, marched out for the 
purpose of reconnoitering the enemy. Whilst advancing they received 
a volley from the left of the enemy’s infantry, and after a sharp en¬ 
counter with their cavalry, in which ours acted extremely well and 
performed some feats of daring chivalry, they retired in good order, 
having had two men severely wounded and several horses killed. In 
the meantime, the infantry under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel 
Millard, and Colonel Burleson’s regiment with the artillery, had 
marched out for the purpose of covering the retreat of the cavalry, 
if necessary. All then fell back in good order to our encampment 
about sunset, and remained without any ostensible action until the 
2ist, at half past three o’clock, taking the first refreshment that they 
had enjoyed for two days. The enemy in the meantime extended the 
right flank of their infantry so as to occupy the extreme point of a 
skirt of timber on the bank of the San Jacinto, and secured their left 
by a fortification about five feet high, constructed of packs and bag¬ 
gage, leaving an opening in the center of the breastwork in which 
their artillery was placed, their cavalry upon their left wing. 

About nine o’clock on the morning of the 21st, the enemy were 
reinforced by 500 choice troops, under the command of General Cos, 
increasing their effective force to upwards of 1,500 men, whilst our 
aggregate force for the field numbered 783. At half past three o’clock 
in the evening, I ordered the officers of the Texan army to parade their 
respective commands, having in the meantime ordered the bridge on 
the only road communicating with the Brazos, distant eight miles from 
our encampment, to be destroyed, thus cutting off all possibility of 
escape. Our troops paraded with alacrity and spirit, and were anxious 
for the contest. Their conscious disparity in numbers seemed only 
to increase their enthusiasm and confidence and heighten their anxiety 
for the conflict. Our situation afforded me the opportunity for mak¬ 
ing the arrangements preparatory to the attack, without exposing our 
designs to the enemy. The first regiment, commanded by Colonel 
Burleson, was assigned the center. The second regiment, under the 
command of Colonel Sherman, formed the left wing of the army. The 
artillery under the special command of Colonel George W. Hockley, 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


307 


Inspector-General, was placed on the right of the first regiment; and 
four companies of infantry, under the command of Lieut.-Col. Henry 
Millard, sustained the artillery upon the right. Our cavalry, sixty-one 
in number, commanded by Colonel Mirabeau B. Lamar, whose gallant 
and daring conduct on the previous day had attracted the admiration 
of his comrades and called him to that station, placed on our extreme 
right, completed our line. Our cavalry was first dispatched to the 
front of the enemy’s left, for the purpose of attracting their notice, 
whilst an extensive island of timber afforded us an opportunity of 
concentrating our forces and deploying from that point, agreeably to 
the previous design of the troops. Every evolution was performed 
with alacrity, the whole advancing rapidly in line and through an 
open prairie, without any protection whatever for our men. The 
artillery advanced and took station within two hundred yards of the 
enemy’s breastwork, and commenced an effective fire with grape and 
canister. 

Colonel Sherman with his regiment, having commenced the action 
upon our left wing, the whole line at the center and on the right, 
advancing in double-quick time, rung the war cry, ‘Remember the 
Alamo!’ received the enemy’s fire and advanced within point blank 
shot before a piece was discharged from our lines. Our lines ad¬ 
vanced without a halt, until they were in possession of the woodland 
and the breastwork, the right wing of Burleson’s and the left of Mil¬ 
lard’s taking possession of the breastwork; our artillery having gal¬ 
lantly charged up within seventy yards of the enemy’s cannon, when 
it was taken by our troops. The conflict lasted about eighteen min¬ 
utes from the time of close action until we were in possession of the 
enemy’s encampment, taking one piece of cannon (loaded), four 
stands of colors, all their camp equipage, stores and baggage. Our 
cavalry had charged and routed that of the enemy upon the right, 
and given pursuit to the fugitives, which did not cease until they 
arrived at the bridge which I have mentioned before, Captain Karnes, 
always among the foremost in danger, commanding the pursuers. The 
conflict in the breastwork lasted but a few moments; many of the 
troops encountered hand to hand, and not having the advantage of 
bayonets on our side, our riflemen used pieces as war clubs, breaking 
many of them off at the breech. The rout commenced at half past 
four, and the pursuit by the main army continued until twilight. A 
guard was then left in charge of the enemy’s encampment, and our 
army returned with their killed and wounded. In the battle our loss 
was two killed and twenty-three wounded, six of them mortally. The 
enemy’s loss was 630 killed, among whom was one general officer, 
four colonels, two lieutenant-colonels, five captains, twelve lieutenants. 
Wounded: 208, of which were: five colonels, three lieutenant-colonels, 
two second-lieutenant-colonels, seven captains, one cadet. Prisoners, 
730; President-General Santa Anna, General Cos, four colonels, aides 


308 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


to General Santa Anna, and the colonel of the Guerrero battalion are 
included in the number. General Santa Anna was not taken until the 
22nd, and General Cos on yesterday, very few having escaped. 

About six hundred muskets, three hundred sabres and two hundred 
pistols have been collected since the action. Several hundred mules 
and horses were taken, and near twelve thousand dollars in specie. 
For several days previous to the action our troops were engaged in 
forced marches, exposed to excessive rains, and the additional incon¬ 
venience of extremely bad roads, illy supplied with rations and cloth¬ 
ing ; yet, amid every difficulty, they bore up with cheerfulness and for¬ 
titude, and performed their marches with spirit and alacrity. There 
was no murmuring. 

Previous to and during the action, my staff evinced every dis¬ 
position to be useful, and were actively engaged in their duties. In 
the conflict I am assured they demeaned themselves in such manner 
as proved them worthy members of the Army of San Jacinto. Colonel 
Thos. J. Rusk, Secretary of War, was on the field. For weeks his 
services had been highly beneficial to the army; in battle he was on the 
left wing, where Colonel Sherman’s command first encountered and 
drove the enemy. He bore himself gallantly, and continued his efforts 
and activity, remaining with the pursuers until resistance ceased. 

I have the honor of transmitting herewith a list of all the officers 
and men who were engaged in the action, which I respectfully request 
may be published as an act of justice to the individuals. For the 
commanding general to attempt discrimination as to the conduct of 
those who commanded in the action, or those who were commanded, 
would be impossible. Our success in the action is conclusive proof 
of such daring intrepidity and courage; every officer and man proved 
himself worthy of the cause in which he battled, while the triumph 
received a lustre from the humanity which characterized their con¬ 
duct after victory, and richly entitles them to the admiration and 
gratitude of their general. Nor should we withhold the tribute of 
our grateful thanks from that Being who rules the destinies of na¬ 
tions, and has in the time of greatest need enabled us to arrest a 
powerful invader, whilst devastating our country. 

I have the honor to be, with high consideration, 

Your obedient servant, Sam Houston, 

Commander-in-Chief. 


III. Santa Anna’s Account of the Battle of San Jacinto 
Translated by Carlos E. Castaneda 

[The selection which follows is from Santa Anna’s report to the Mexican 
Secretary of War and Marine, dated March 11, 1837. Santa Anna’s complete 
report may be read in Carlos E. Castaneda, The Mexican Side of the Texan 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


309 


Revolution, 1-89. Other Mexican accounts of the campaign are those of Santa 
Anna’s secretary, Ramon Martinez Caro, who sharply criticizes Santa Anna, of 
Generals Filisola and Urrea, who participated in the campaign, and of General 
Jose Maria Tornel, who was Secretary of War and Marine.] 

Through some of the colonists taken, among them a Mexican, I 
discovered that the heads of the Texas government, Don Lorenzo 
Zavala, and other leaders of the revolution were at Harrisburg, 
twelve leagues distant on the right bank of Buffalo Bayou; and that 
their arrest was certain if our troops marched upon them without 
loss of time. More important than the news was the rapidity of 
our march, which, if successful, would completely disconcert the re¬ 
bellion. Without confiding in anyone I decided to take advantage of 
the opportunity. I made the grenadiers and riflemen who had cap¬ 
tured the crossing, the battalion of regulars of Matamoros, the 
dragoons of my escort, a six-pounder well supplied with ammunition, 
and fifty cases of small ammunition cross the river; and I started 
with these forces towards Harrisburg the afternoon of the 14th. I 
left General Ramirez y Sesma with the rest of the troops of his 
division at Thompson’s and gave him sealed orders for General 
Filisola. 

I entered Harrisburg the night of the 15th, lighted by the glare 
of several houses that were burning, and found only a Frenchman 
and two North Americans working in a print shop. They declared 
that the so-called president, vice-president, and other important, per¬ 
sonages had left at noon for the island of Galveston in a small steam¬ 
boat.; that, the families to whom the houses belonged were making 
their way to the same place; that the fire had been accidental, they 
having been unable to put it out; that the families had abandoned 
their homes by order of General Houston who was at Groce’s Cross¬ 
ing with 800 men and two four-pounders. 

The arrest of the leaders of the rebellion having been frustrated, 
and knowing the location of the enemy and its strength, I ordered 
Colonel Juan N. Almonte with the 50 dragoons of my escort to make 
a reconnoissance as far as the crossings at Lynchburg and New Wash¬ 
ington in order to be better able to decide upon my subsequent opera¬ 
tions. From the last mentioned place the said colonel told me among 
other things that several colonists found in their homes uniformly 
asserted that General Houston was retreating to the Trinity by way 
of Lynchburg. 

To intercept Houston’s march and to destroy with one blow the 
armed forces and the hopes of the revolutionists was too important 
a blow to allow the opportunity to escape. I decided to take the cross¬ 
ing at Lynchburg before his arrival and to avail myself of the advan¬ 
tages afforded by the country. The first question was to reenforce 
the division that accompanied me, composed of one cannon, 700 in¬ 
fantry and 50 cavalry, in order to make it superior in number to that 


310 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


of the enemy, which it surpassed in discipline. I issued instructions 
to General Filisola to stop the march of General Cos to Velasco, or¬ 
dered in my previous instructions, and to send me immediately under 
the command of the said general 500 chosen infantry which were to 
join me as soon as possible. This order was taken to him with all 
speed by my aide-de-camp, Lieut. Col. Jose Maria Castillo e Iberri. 
Colonel Almonte was at the port of New Washington, on the shores 
of Galveston Bay, exposed to the enemy ships that might arrive; and 
it was necessary to insure the large amount of food supplies that he 
had succeeded in taking. I, therefore, marched toward that point 
the afternoon of the 18th. When I arrived a schooner was in sight, 
which, because of the lack of wind, could not get out to sea. I tried 
to capture it in order to make use of it, when the time came, against 
the island of Galveston, but just as the boats and barges that Colonel 
Almonte had secured were being made ready a steamboat came and 
set it on fire. 

In the early morning of the 19th I sent Captain Marcos Barragan 
with some dragoons to the crossing at Lynchburg, three leagues dis¬ 
tant from New Washington, to keep a lookout and to give me timely 
notice of the arrival of Houston. At eight o’clock, the morning of 
the 20th, Captain Barragan came to me and told me that Houston 
was approaching Lynchburg. All the members of the division heard 
of the approach of the enemy with joy, and in the highest spirits 
continued the march already started towards that place. 

When I arrived, Houston had taken possession of the woods on 
the banks of Buffalo Bayou, whose waters join the San Jacinto at 
that point and flow into those of Galveston. His position would force 
him to fight or take to the water. The enthusiasm of my troops was 
such that I immediately engaged him in battle; but although our fire 
was returned, I was unable to draw him from the woods. I wanted 
to draw him out to a place that suited me better. I retired about 
one thousand varas and camped on a hill that gave me an advanta¬ 
geous position, with water on the rear, heavy woods to our right as 
far as the banks of the San Jacinto, open plains to the left, and a 
clear front. 

While taking our position, the cannonade was kept up by the 
enemy and Captain Fernando Urriza was wounded. About one hun¬ 
dred mounted men sallied forth from the woods and daringly threw 
themselves upon my escort placed on our left. For a moment they 
succeeded in throwing it into confusion, seriously wounding one of 
the dragoons. I ordered two companies of riflemen to attack them 
and these were sufficient to rout them, sending them back to the 
woods. Some of their infantry had also started out; but, on seeing 
their cavalry retreating, they turned back to the woods. 

It must have been about five in the afternoon, and, the troops 
needing both food and rest, the remainder of the day was spent at- 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


311 


tending to these indispensable necessities. A good watch was kept 
during the night. I occupied myself with the best distribution of 
our forces and the construction of a parapet that would afford more 
protection to our cannon, placing it in a more advantageous location. 
This was the disposition of our camp: The woods to our right were 
defended by three chosen companies; in the center the regular 
battalion of Matamoros in battle formation took its place; and to the 
left was our cannon, protected by the cavalry and a column of chosen 
companies under the command of Lieut. Col. Santiago Luelmo who 
was to act as our reserve. 

At nine o’clock on the morning of the 21st, in full view of the 
enemy, General Cos arrived with 400 men from the battalions of 
Aldama, Guerrero, Toluca, and Guadalajara. He left one hundred 
men under the command of Colonel Mariano Garcia to bring up the 
baggage that was detained at a bad crossing near Harrisburg. These 
men never joined us. I immediately saw that my order with respect 
to the 500 chosen infantry had been disregarded, for the greater part 
of the reenforcement was made up of recruits that had been dis¬ 
tributed among our troops from San Luis Potosi and Saltillo. In 
view of the circumstances that made me superior to the enemy, this 
serious disobedience instantly caused me the greatest displeasure, 
realizing that the reenforcement so anxiously awaited and with which 
I expected to inflict a decisive blow to the enemy was insufficient. 

Nevertheless, I tried to take advantage of the favorable impres¬ 
sion which I noticed reflected in the countenances of the troops at the 
arrival of General Cos. He explained to me, however, that forced to 
march continuously in order to arrive quickly, the troops under his 
command had neither slept nor eaten in twenty-four hours; that while 
awaiting the arrival of their baggage, which should take from two 
to three hours, the troops should be permitted to rest and prepare 
for battle. I granted his request and consented to the troops resting 
and eating. 

I placed my escort, reenforced by 32 men mounted on officers’ 
horses, in a strategic position from which it could observe the enemy 
and give protection to the already mentioned baggage. Hardly had 
an hour passed since the last disposition, when General Cos came 
to me to ask me, in the name of Captain Miguel Aguirre, command¬ 
ant of the escort, that he be permitted to allow Ins troops to eat and 
to water and feed the horses which had not been fed since the day 
before. The pitiful tone in which this petition was made moved me 
to grant it, warning him, however, that as soon as the men were 
through, Captain Aguirre should immediately take up his position 
as ordered. His failure to do so contributed to the surprise that the 
enemy succeeded in effecting. 

Fatigued as a result of having spent the morning on horseback, 
and not having slept the night before, I lay down under the shade of 


312 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

some trees while the troops ate their rations. I sent for General 
Manuel Fernandez Castrillon, who was acting as major general, and 
I ordered him to keep a close watch and to advise me of the slightest 
movement of the enemy. I also asked him to wake me up as soon 
as the troops had eaten, for it was necessary to take decisive action 
as soon as possible. 

As fatigue and long vigils provoke heavy slumber, I was sleeping 
deeply and when the din and fire of battle awoke me. I immediately 
became aware that we were being attacked and that great disorder 
prevailed. The enemy had surprised our advance guard, a party 
attacked the three chosen companies that guarded the woods to our 
right and took possession of them, increasing the confusion with their 
unfailing rifles. The rest of the infantry of the enemy was making 
a front attack, protected by their two cannon, while their cavalry 
charged our left. 

Although the evil was done, I thought for a moment that it might 
be repaired. I ordered the permanent battalion of Aldama to reenforce 
that of Matamoros, which was sustaining the line of battle; and hur¬ 
riedly organized an attack column under orders of Colonel Manuel 
Cespedes, composed of the permanent battalion of Guerrero and de¬ 
tachments from Toluca and Guadalajara, which, simultaneously with 
the column of Colonel Luelmo, marched forward to check the principal 
advance of the enemy. My efforts were all in vain. The front line 
was abandoned by the two battalions that were holding it, notwith¬ 
standing the continuous fire of our artillery commanded by the brave 
Lieutenant Arenal. The two newly organized columns were dispersed, 
Colonel Cespedes being wounded and Captain Luelmo killed. General 
Castrillon, who ran from side to side to restore order among our ranks, 
fell mortally wounded. The recruits bunched themselves and confused 
the tried soldiers, and neither the first nor the second made any use 
of their weapons. In the meantime the enemy, taking advantage of 
the opportunity, carried their charge forward rapidly, and shouting 
madly, secured a victory in a few minutes which they did not dream 
was possible. 

All hope lost, with everyone escaping as best he could, my despair 
was as great as the danger I was in. A servant of my aide-de-camp, 
Juan Bringas, with noble kindness offered me the horse of his master, 
and earnestly pleaded that I save myself. I looked about for my 
escort and was told by two dragoons who were hurriedly saddling 
their horses that their companions and officers had fled. I remem¬ 
bered that General Filisola was at Thompson’s Crossing, sixteen 
leagues distant, and, without hesitation, I tried to make my way to 
that place through the enemy’s ranks. They pursued me and over¬ 
took me a league and a half from the battlefield at a large creek 
where the bridge had been burnt. I turned my horse loose and with 
difficulty took refuge in a grove of small pine trees. The coming of 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


313 


night permitted me to evade their vigilance. The hope of rejoining 
the army and of vindicating its honor gave me strength to cross the 
creek with the water above my waist, and I continued on my route 
afoot. In an abandoned house I found some clothes which I ex¬ 
changed for my wet ones. At eleven o’clock of the 22nd I was 
overtaken again by my pursuers just as I was crossing a plain, and 
thus I fell into their hands. Not recognizing me because of my clothes, 
they asked me if I had seen General Santa Anna. I replied that he 
was ahead of me and this happy thought saved me from being assas¬ 
sinated on the spot as I found out later. 

Your Excellency will see at once, from what I have stated, the 
principal causes of an event that has, with justice, astonished the 
nation and for which I alone have been held responsible. I have 
been thought dead, and consequently unable to present the facts as 
they were. But since, fortunately, I find myself alive and enjoying 
freedom, I am obliged to cleanse the facts until the causes stand out 
as clearly as the light of day in order that justice may render its 
verdict. I esteem too much a reputation won by dint of long and 
costly sacrifices to permit it to be soiled with impunity, especially by 
those who should be the last to impugn it. Limiting myself to those 
faults committed by some of my subordinates that were, directly or 
indirectly, the cause of the lamentable catastrophe I am discussing, I 
will ask Your Excellency to keep in mind that General Filisola sent 
me a reenforcement made up of recruits when he could have sent 
me seasoned soldiers. He had with him the battalion of sappers, made 
up of veteran troops in its entirety, but he did not send me a single 
man out of it. Being able to have selected the best men from the 
regular battalions of Guerrero, Aldama, Activos de Mexico, Toluca, 
and Guadalajara, he failed to do so. Thus, he disregarded the very 
spirit of my instructions, for, if I distinctly ordered him to send me 
500 picked men, it was because I wanted no recruits to be sent, aware 
as I was that there were many among our troops. Had not this been 
clearly my purpose I would have used some other phrase. 

The sending of Captain Miguel Bachiller with special mail that 
had arrived from that capital, dispatched to me by the supreme gov¬ 
ernment, and which was intercepted, was no less a cause. As a result, 
the enemy acquired positive information regarding our forces at a 
time when it was retreating, wondering what it could do, astonished 
by our operations and triumphs. Thus it became aware that I was 
at New Washington, it learned the number that made up the division 
that was operating in that region and the situation of the rest of our 
forces, all of which cleared the confusion in which it found itself as 
a result of our continuous offensive and the appearance of our vic¬ 
torious columns at the points least expected. From the despatches it 
learned everything that it desired; and, coming out from the uncer¬ 
tainty that was making it retreat to the Trinity, it gained new courage. 


314 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


This could not have happened without knowing that my force was 
inferior to theirs. The arrival of the reenforcements under General 
Cos was regarded by the enemy as a ruse, believing it a party sent 
out during the night before to return in the morning in full view. 
This was told to me by the enemy afterwards. 

Such was the terror that prevailed throughout Texas as a result 
of the operations of the army under my command that in order to 
dissipate it General Thomas J. Rusk, acting secretary of war of the 
government of Texas, told me that he had had to go to the camp 
where his forces were and assure them that General Santa Anna had 
returned to Mexico as a result of an internal revolution in the repub¬ 
lic; that he did this to stop the desertion of many of the volunteers 
that hadl come from the United States whom he was unable to hold. 

It is to be particularly remembered that General Filisola had no 
instructions to send me any correspondence. If he had wanted to 
insure its safe conduct, he could have sent it to me later with General 
Cos. I do not see how the fatal results that would follow the falling 
of such important correspondence into the hands of the enemy can 
have escaped him. 

General Gaona, who did not join me as he should—the cause of 
whose delay I have not yet learned—prevented me from setting out 
from Thompson’s Crossing with twice the force I had. I took only 
700 infantry in order to leave General Ramirez y Sesma the necessary 
force for the protection of that point. In view of this fact, I asked 
for the above mentioned reenforcement in order to make my forces 
superior to the enemy. 

General Cos reduced his 500 men by leaving 100 near Harrisburg 
as an escort for the baggage he was conducting. I can see no reason 
for his bringing this baggage when I had asked General Filisola to 
send me only fifty cases of ammunition. General Cos brought only 
part of these munitions, but he brought all the baggage belonging to 
the troops that had remained at Thompson’s, this in spite of the fact 
that a called reenforcement is supposed to march as lightly equipped 
as possible in order not to be unduly burdened, for it is known that 
excessive baggage slows up the march. The reenforcement was thus 
reduced by one-fifth, and 100 men were left seriously exposed, saving 
themselves by mere chance. 

Lastly, the conduct of General Castrillon and of the other officers 
to whom the vigilance of our camp, in full view of the enemy, was 
entrusted contributed considerably to the already mentioned misfor¬ 
tune. I regret to have to discuss an individual who is dead, one whom 
I always regarded with esteem. Likewise, I regret to have to speak 
of others who are still living, but duty obliges me to relate the facts 
such as they were. I have positive evidence to prove that all the time 
I was sleeping the said general occupied himself with making his 
toilet and changing his clothes; and that when the enemy attacked and 
surprised our advanced guards, he was whiling away his time in a 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


315 


party with other officers of my staff. He did not inspect our outposts 
a single time, and his example was followed by the other officers. 
Thus, part of the troops were sleeping, while those who were awake, 
not being vigilant, permitted the enemy to carry out a surprise that 
could not have been more complete had it taken place in the middle 
of the night. As a result it was easy for the enemy to take possession 
of the woods on our right with only 116 men, in spite of being de¬ 
fended by three chosen companies. Though they outnumbered the 
enemy, they offered no resistance. This was the source of the encour¬ 
agement that enabled the enemy to continue the charge, as well as 
the cause of the confusion in our camp, increased by the panic that 
possessed the recruits, who, unable to use their arms, permitted the 
enemy to assassinate them in cold blood. It is true that General 
Castrillon conducted himself with extraordinary bravery, as I have 
stated, during the last moments of the engagement, but his efforts then 
were useless; and, before he breathed his last, his remorse must have 
been great if he paused to think how he neglected his duty at a time 
when he should have attended to it. 

My duties as general-in-chief did not forbid my resting, for no 
general is forbidden this necessity, nor can it be expected that he 
should not succumb to natural needs, particularly under the condi¬ 
tions and at the time of day that I did. I confided, as I had a right 
to do, in that my orders would be observed. A general-in-chief cannot 
discharge the duties of a subaltern-officer, or a soldier. Each class 
has its respective duties and attributes assigned. If the failings of 
inferiors cannot be taken as an excuse by their superiors in general, 
there are exceptions such as the case in hand, especially if the circum¬ 
stances explained are taken into consideration. 

They have, perhaps, tried to accuse me of being incautious because 
I did not march with all my troops in a body, but chose to advance 
with only a small division as I did. In the first place, it is necessary 
to keep in mind, in oder to destroy this objection, that I left Thomp¬ 
son’s Crossing to execute an important operation whose purpose was 
to surprise and capture with a single blow the directors of the revo¬ 
lution who were but a short distance away. As soon as I discovered 
that the enemy was retreating by way of Lynchburg, I asked for re¬ 
enforcements in order to make my force superior to theirs. Lastly, 
there was no advantage to be gained by the army marching along a 
single route, and in a body; because, after having driven the enemy 
from all points, there was no enemy force to fight except that found 
at the point and place indicated. Since the direction followed by the 
enemy showed clearly that it intended to retreat beyond the Trinity, 
it was necessary, in order that no one be left to fire a single shot 
from the Rio Bravo to the Sabine to cut off its retreat and to force 
it to fight rather than to attack the rear guard. The march of the 
whole army would have been adverse to this important plan that 
would put an end to the question with a single blow. The slowness 
with which the army would have had to move as a result of its 


316 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


baggage, trains, etc., would have permitted the enemy to get so far 
ahead of us that we could not have overtaken it, considering the 
obstacles presented by the country and its large rivers. 

The force under my command was superior in quality to that of 
the enemy; it was well supplied with food and munitions, and it held 
an advantageous position. That of the enemy was inferior in number; 
it was cut off by Buffalo Bayou and the San Jacinto, and occupied 
a disadvantageous position. The enemy was without food. An at¬ 
tempt to draw it into battle had been made on the previous day, before 
the arrival of our reenforcement, but the challenge had been refused. 
Who, under such conditions, would have waited to mobilize a whole 
army, losing precious moments in the meantime? Who could have 
doubted victory? I appeal to the impartial judgment of the intelligent 
classes, feeling confident that, far from siding with envy and malice 
in imputing carelessness, precipitation and lack of foresight on my 
part, they will admit that judgment, foresight, and discretion were 
exercised in considering the circumstances and that if these did not 
result in victory as it was expected, it was through no lack of plan, 
nor failure of coordination in the operations, nor the dispositions of 
the general-in-chief. 

Having demonstrated, as I have done, that the catastrophe of San 
Jacinto was caused purely by the faults and carelessness of some of 
my subordinates and the disregard of orders by others, there remains 
nothing for me but to deplore my participation in the engagement. 
My regrets are mitigated, however, when I remember that I did every¬ 
thing that was in my power, exceeding the duties of a general-in-chief, 
to serve my country well. I find no other excess in my conduct than 
my zeal for the interests of the country, placing them above my own 
and subordinating everything else to the desire to defend them well 
and to cover with glory the arms intrusted to me. 

Fortune turned its back upon me at the very moment when my 
efforts were to be crowned with success, preventing me from having 
the satisfaction of presenting a new laurel to the nation, and leaving 
my desire unknown. 


IV. The “Runaway Scrape”: The Non-Combatants in the 
Texas Revolution 

By Mrs. Dilue Harris 

[Mrs. Harris’s “Reminiscences” are published in the Quarterly of the Texas 
State Historical Association, IV, 85-127, 155-189, VII, 214-222. The selection 
which follows is from IV, 124-127, 156-179. Mrs. Harris combined with her 
recollections a diary kept by her father, Dr. Pleasant W. Rose.] 

June, 1835 .—School and War 

School commenced the first of June. There were only ten pupils, 


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three girls, six boys and one young man, Harvey Stafford. The 
teacher boarded around among the neighbors. 

We had been going to school two weeks when there was another 
excitement. Father went to Harrisburg and found the men making 
threats against the garrison at Anahuac. Mr. Andrew Briscoe had 
a large stock of goods there, and it was the chief port of entry east 
of the Brazos. Captain Tenorio, the Mexican custom house officer, 
would not allow him to sell goods without a permit from the custom 
house. When father left Harrisburg the men and boys were drilling 
and threatening to disarm the garrison. Mr. Choate, Dave Harris, 
and father advised them not to do it, as Stephen F. Austin was a 
prisoner in Mexico, and it might endanger his life. This was very 
discouraging. 

Mr. Stafford had heard from his father and step-mother. She 
was to return in the winter and take all their slaves to the United 
States. She did not have any trouble with those she took back the 
year before. She said she could do better than a man running slaves 
into the United States. She said that they got news from Mexico 
through the papers that it was the intention of the Mexican govern¬ 
ment to garrison every town in Texas and liberate the slaves. The 
United States government was to station troops at the Sabine river 
to prevent the slave holders from crossing, and it was to send also 
a warship to the Gulf of Mexico. 

The school did well. There was no sickness. The grown young 
men started to school. Three of them and the teacher camped in 
the schoolhouse and did their own cooking. Mother and Mrs. Dyer 
gave them milk, butter and eggs, and they went home Friday evening. 
Mr. Henson spent Saturdays and Sundays with the neighbors. The 
young men were anxious for the school to be kept open in the summer, 
as they had to work in the fall and winter. 

There was some trouble at Anahuac. A courier came to our house 
from Harrisburg, going to San Felipe with a dispatch, stating there 
had been fighting at Anahuac. Captain Tenorio had arrested Andrew 
Briscoe and Clinton Harris and put them in prison and wounded 
several Texans. Clinton Harris went from Harrisburg to buy dry 
goods from Mr. Briscoe, when the Mexican officer, Captain Tenorio, 
ordered him not to move the goods. While he and his assistant, 
Mr. Smith, were going to the boat, they were fired on, and Mr. Smith 
was wounded in the breast. Clinton Harris was released and the 
next day he returned to Harrisburg. He wrote out a statement and 
sent it to San Felipe to William B. Travis. 

This news stopped our school, as the teacher and young men 
decided to go to Harrisburg. There had been a meeting at San Felipe 
which recommended that the garrison at Anahuac be disarmed. Mr. 
W. B. Travis went to Harrisburg where he raised a company of men 
mostly from San Jacinto and Buffalo Bayou. They took a cannon 
and put it on a cart used for hauling logs to the saw mill. They 


318 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


shipped the men and cannon on a small schooner. They set sail 
for Anahuac and arrived there the last of June. They forced 
Captain Tenorio and the garrison to capitulate. Mr. Briscoe was 
released from prison. This broke up Anahuac as a port of entry. 
The Mexicans and the men under Mr. Travis boarded the schooner 
and returned to Harrisburg. 

The citizens of Harrisburg had been preparing for a grand ball 
and barbecue before the trouble at Anahuac. When they heard the 
Mexicans would be brought there they sent word to the people of 
the different settlements to attend. 

The disarming of the garrison at Anahuac was not approved by 
the older citizens. Those who had families with all they possessed 
in Texas wished rather to pay duties to Mexico than to fight. 


July, 1835 .—Tto Celebration of the Fourth of July after 
the Fall of Anahuac 

Well, the Fourth of July brought out quite a crowd. The Texans 
and Mexicans arrived in time for the barbecue, but the ball was put 
off until the fifth. A man died in town the morning of the Fourth, 
and Mr. Choate, the musician, would not play till the corpse was 
buried. The men spent the day talking war and politics. Families 
from the country camped. Ladies were shopping and visiting and 
young people were having a good time. Mr. Travis and P. H. Jack 
had been prisoners in Anahuac in the year 1832. In this year they 
were having their revenge. Captain Tenorio walked among the 
people shaking hands with the men and acting as if he was the hero 
of the occasion. The Mexican soldiers sat and smoked and played 
cards. The funeral came off the morning of the fifth, everybody 
attending. Mr. Choate read the burial services, and after the funeral 
we had dinner and then dancing. We danced in a new storehouse. 
It was built by Mr. Stafford. He would have brought dry goods and 
opened a store if the trouble at Anahuac could have been peaceably 
arranged. The Mexican officers were at the ball. They did not dance 
country dances. Mr. Kokernot and his wife were Germans. They 
waltzed, and Captain Tenorio danced with Mrs. Kokernot. She could 
speak French and Captain Tenorio also was a French scholar, so they 
danced and talked all the evening. She was handsome and he a fine 
looking man, and they attracted a great deal of attention. 

The people went home on the sixth, the young folks happy, the 
old people gloomy. The Mexican prisoners were to be sent to San 
Antonio in a few days. The disarming of the garrison at Anahuac 
was without bloodshed. There was but one man wounded, and he 
was shot by the Mexicans when they arrested Mr. Briscoe and Clin¬ 
ton Harris. 

Our school opened again on the tenth. The teacher said the 


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young men and boys did not study. They talked war all the time 
and seemed to think that two or three hundred Texans could whip 
Mexico. 

Major Bingham went to San Felipe, and on his return he stayed 
one night with father. He thought William B. Travis and others 
would keep up the agitation. He said there was an order from San 
Antonio to arrest several Texans and send them to Mexico for trial, 
but there was no one to make the arrest. 


August, 1835 

Father was the only man in this neighborhood that had seen war. 
He said he had done his share in 1812. Mr. Henson and Major 
Bingham were both Irish and had seen when quite young the rebel¬ 
lion in Ireland in the year 1798. It seemed that they would be glad 
to fight England or the Indians. Both were ready to raise volunteers 
and would defend Travis and his companions if necessary. 

The farmers had fine crops. Cotton was open and corn getting 
hard. Our school was doing well, but the people were in dread all 
the time. When the news was received in Mexico that Anahuac had 
been forced to surrender by the Texans, an order was issued to 
Colonel Ugartechea to arrest seven Texans and send them to San 
Antonio to be tried by court martial. This was more than the people 
could bear. There was great excitement. A convention was called 
to meet at San Felipe the 12th of September. There was a meeting 
in our neighborhood to elect a delegate to this convention. The farm¬ 
ers had not much time to spare, but they would not see the Texans 
arrested. 

There was a strange Mexican at San Felipe who said he was 
just from Mexico. He said there was a large army marching from 
Mexico to garrison San Antonio, Anahuac, Velasco and all towns in 
Texas. He said Stephen F. Austin had been liberated and would soon 
be home. He advised the people to stop holding political meetings 
and give up the men who disarmed the garrison at Anahuac. He 
spoke English and said he was a friend of Stephen F. Austin and to 
Texas. Our people did not believe a word the Mexican said. They 
thought the Mexican government had sent him to watch the Texans. 
Some of them would have had him arrested, but there was no jail 
in Austin’s colony, and no one had time to guard the man. At the 
election in our neighborhood Mr. C. C. Dyer was chosen a delegate 
to the convention. Harrisburg elected Andrew Briscoe and William 
P. Harris. The convention was called to meet at San Felipe, the 
capital of Texas. 

A priest, Padre Alpuche, disappeared. He had been traveling in 
Texas and Louisiana several years. He was loved by Protestants as 
well as Catholics. The young people looked for his arrival with 


320 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the greatest pleasure. He would marry all those who had signed a 
certificate before the Mexican alcalde to remarry when the priest 
came. He would baptize the children, bury the dead, visit the sick 
and pray for the dying. He had not been in San Felipe for three 
years. When he appeared there he was riding a good mule. He 
said he had been in Europe and had landed at New Orleans and 
gone from there to Nacogdoches. He heard in New Orleans of the 
trouble in Texas. He did not take any part in political affairs, but 
pretended to be a friend to the Texans. He stayed a week in San 
Felipe, stopping at the boarding house. He could speak English and 
heard all the Texans had to say. He came in the night. One morn¬ 
ing he saddled his mule and went to the river to water the mule, and 
that was the last time he was seen. 

October, 1835 

The convention met at San Felipe in October. The first act 
was a call for volunteers to capture San Antonio before it could be 
reinforced by General Cos. 

Our school closed in September. The teacher said there was so 
much excitement that it affected the small children, and the young 
men could not be got back in school at all after the election in Sep¬ 
tember. There was a constant talk of war. Messengers from San 
Felipe going to Brazoria and Harrisburg stopped at our house from 
time to time and told the news. All the men in our neighborhood 
went to San Felipe. Stephen F. Austin was elected to command 
the army, and it was to rendezvous on the Guadalupe river at 
Gonzales. 

This month we heard again from the priest, Padre Alpuche. He 
was in San Antonio, and had been in fact a spy sent from Mexico 
through New Orleans and Nacogdoches to San Felipe. 

November, 1835 

Mrs. Stafford came home in a schooner from New Orleans. She 
had spent two weeks in that city waiting for the schooner. She said 
there was a good deal of excitement there about Texas, but they 
never got any news direct from Mexico. The captains of ships told 
them that Mexico had no idea of sending a large army to Texas. 
We heard so many different reports that we did not know what to 
believe. Mrs. Stafford was to stay until spring and take some of the 
negroes back to the United States. She would have gone at once, 
but she had to wait until the cotton was gathered and sold. 

There was no mistake about General Cos and his army. He got 
to San Antonio before the Texans organized. It was said that he 
was going to march through Texas during the winter, liberate the 
slaves, and force all discontented persons to leave the country. Every 


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321 


man and boy that had a gun and horse went to the army, and the 
women and children were left to finish picking the cotton. There 
were but three men left in our neighborhood—father, Adam Stafford, 
and Moses Shipman. Father was keeping two boys, one named Alex¬ 
ander Armstrong, and the other William Morris. They were orphans 
and half brothers. One of them was fifteen years old, and the other 
eleven. Brother Granville was thirteen. These boys were picking 
cotton and talking war all the time. Father said if they had guns 
and horses they would go to the army. 

Mr. Dyer came home from San Felipe and said there was so much 
dissension among the delegates he would not wait for the convention 
to adjourn. As he and his wife were going to the United States on 
business, he thought it best to come away. They went on to the United 
States, taking passage from Harrisburg on the same schooner that 
Mrs. Stafford came home on. Adam Stafford and Mr. Dyer shipped 
cotton at the same time. 

Since the garrison at Anahuac had been forced to surrender, the 
schooners were coming to Harrisburg frequently. The captains said 
there was a Mexican war vessel near Galveston Island. Farmers 
in our neighborhood would not ship any more cotton from Harrisburg 
then. A steamboat had been sent from New Orleans, which was to 
run from Brazoria on the Brazos river to San Felipe and Washing¬ 
ton, and the cotton at Stafford’s gin w T as to be hauled and piled near 
Mr. William Little’s at the Henry Jones ferry. The steamboat was 
the Yellowstone. She had been in the St. Louis trade when father’s 
family lived in that city in the years ’29 to ’32. She was now to 
remain in the Texas trade, and was to carry the cotton to the mouth 
of the Brazos, where it was to be shipped on schooners to New 
Orleans. Father had promised us children to take us to see the steam¬ 
boat when she was at the landing, and Mr. Jones said he would give 
a grand ball Christmas, when the captain of the boat had told him 
he expected to be at the ferry. Mr. Jones lived on the west bank 
of the Brazos, and Mr. Little on the east bank. 

We heard that the Texans had General Cos and the Mexican army 
surrounded in San Antonio, and that there had been fighting, but 
that none of our neighbors were engaged in it except Leo Roark. 
His mother and sisters were very uneasy on his account. 

December, 1835 

Everything was at a standstill and times very gloomy. The Brazos 
river was so low the steamboat couldn’t go up. She was to go to 
Groce’s ferry to a little town called Washington. There were two 
towns in Austin’s colony named Washington, one above San Felipe, 
the other on Galveston bay. 1 

1 Washington on Galveston Bay was laid out by Col. James Morgan, and 


322 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


There was a new girl baby at our house born the fifth of the month. 
Sister and I were very happy over the babe. Brother Granville and 
the two orphan boys teased us and said we couldn’t go to see the 
steamboat or attend the ball, but we were so pleased with our little 
sister that we did not care. Father said he was very proud of his 
four daughters, and that he would be as popular as Mr. Choate when 
they were grown. Mr. Choate had seven daughters, three of them 
married. Father said his only trouble was to get a wagon to haul 
his daughters around. 

We heard that the Texans had captured San Antonio, and that 
General Cos was a prisoner. The fighting commenced on the fifth 
of the month, but the Mexicans did not surrender until the tenth. 
None of the men from our neighborhood were killed or wounded, but 
several we knew were wounded. Messrs. Bell and Neal came home 
and said that General Cos and the Mexicans under his command had 
been sent across the Rio Grande. 

Father went to Columbia and Brazoria with a cart-load of peltry, 
consisting of the skins of otters, deer, bears, panthers, wild cats, 
wolves, and ’coons. He was in need of medicines, powder, and lead, 
and could not wait any longer for the steamboat, which went up the 
river later. 

January, 1836 

Father returned home on New Year’s day, after having been gone 
two weeks. He sold the hides and laid in a good supply of drugs 
and medicines. He would have gone to Harrisburg, but there was 
no drug store in that place. He said it would have been better to 
haul his cotton to Harrisburg than wait for the steamboat, and that 
it was doubtful whether he could get it to market before May or 
June. He got an advance of one hundred dollars on his cotton. 
While he was gone he met some of the English people that had lived 
in our neighborhood. Mr. Page had moved to Galveston bay, and 
the Adkinses were living on the Brazos near Columbia. Miss Jane 
Adkins, the pretty English girl, was married, and so was her mother, 
the widow Adkins. 

All the men and boys that went to the army from our part of 
the country had come home and were at work. They seemed to 
think there would be no more trouble with Mexico. There had been 
a garrison of Texas soldiers left at San Antonio under Colonel Travis. 
There were men enough in Texas to have organized a large army 
if they could all have been concentrated at one point. 

was called by him New Washington. It was located on the Johnson Hunter 
league, and as it was the residence of Col. Morgan it became known as Mor¬ 
gan’s Point, which name it bears. At this place, only a few days before the 
battle of San Jacinto, Santa Anna and his staff came near capturing President 
David G. Burnet as the latter was boarding the schooner Flash, Captain Luke 
Falvel, for Galveston.— Adele B. Looscan. 



THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


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The people became very much discouraged on learning that 
Mexico had sent a revenue cutter to Galveston. It didn’t try to land, 
but anchored outside. There were several schooners at Harrisburg 
loaded with cotton and hides, that couldn’t get out. The captains said 
that the first big storm that came would blow the war ship away, and 
that then they would run out. 

February, 1836 

Every farmer was planting corn. Mr. Dyer and his wife came 
from New Orleans on board a schooner which entered the mouth of 
the Brazos, but they didn’t see the revenue cutter. They came on 
the boat to Columbia, and from there on horseback. They had heard 
such bad news that they did not finish their visit. It was that Gen¬ 
erals Santa Anna and Cos with a large army were en route for Texas. 
This news was brought direct from Tampico, Mexico, to New Orleans 
by an American who came on a French ship. The Dyers said men 
and munitions were coming to Texas. We had heard this news 
before, but didn’t know whether it was true. 

Mrs. Stafford went away, taking one negro woman and two negro 
children, besides her own child, and Mr. Harvey Stafford went with 
them. They traveled on horseback, and their friends were very un¬ 
easy on their account, as there were Indians on the Trinity river, 
and also in East Texas. 

The news that Santa Anna was marching on San Antonio was 
confirmed. The people at Goliad and San Patricio were leaving 
their homes, and everybody was preparing to go to the United States. 
There was more or less dissension among the members of the Council 
of the Provisional Government. They deposed Governor Smith and 
installed Lieutenant Governor Robinson. The Mexican army arrived 
at San Antonio, and the Council went to Washington on the Brazos. 
People were crossing the river at Fort Bend and Jones’ ferry going 
east with their cattle and horses. Everybody was talking of running 
from the Mexicans. 

March, 1836 .—The Fall of the Alamo 

The people had been in a state of excitement during the winter. 
They knew that Colonel Travis had but few men to defend San An¬ 
tonio. He was headstrong and precipitated the war with Mexico, 
but died at his post. I remember when his letter came calling for 
assistance. He was surrounded by a large army with General Santa 
Anna in command, and had been ordered to surrender, but fought 
till the last man died. A black flag had been hoisted by the Mexicans. 
This letter came in February. I have never seen it in print, but I 
heard mother read it. When she finished, the courier who brought 
it went on to Brazoria. I was near eleven years old, and I remember 


324 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


well the hurry and confusion. Uncle James Wells came home for 
mother to help him get ready to go to the army. We worked all 
day, and mother sat up that night sewing. She made two striped 
hickory shirts and bags to carry provisions. I spent the day melting 
lead in a pot, dipping it up with a spoon, and moulding bullets. The 
young man camped at our house that night and left the next morn¬ 
ing. Our nearest neighbors, Messrs. Dyer, Bell, and Neal, had fam¬ 
ilies, but went to join General Houston. Father and Mr. Shipman 
were old, and Adam Stafford a cripple, and they stayed at home. 

By the 20th of February the people of San Patricio and other 
western settlements were fleeing for their lives. Every family in our 
neighborhood was preparing to go to the United States, and wagons 
and other vehicles were scarce. Mr. Stafford, with the help of small 
boys and negroes, began gathering cattle. All the large boys had 
gone to the army. 

By the last of February there was more hopeful news. Colonel 
Fannin with five hundred men was marching to San Antonio, and 
General Houston was on the way to Gonzales with ten thousand. 2 

Father finished planting corn. He had hauled away a part of our 
household furniture and other things and hid them in the bottom. 
Mother had packed what bedding, clothes, and provisions she thought 
we should need, ready to leave at a moment’s warning, and Father 
had made arrangements with a Mr. Bundick to haul our family in 
his cart; but we were confident that the army under General Houston 
would whip the Mexicans before they reached the Colorado river. 

Just as the people began to quiet down and go to work, a large 
herd of buffaloes came by. There were three or four thousand of 
them. They crossed the Brazos river above Fort Bend, and came 
out of the bottom at Stafford’s Point, making their first appearance 
before day. They passed in sight of our house, but we could see 
only a dark cloud of dust, which looked like a sand storm. Father 
tried to get a shot at one, but his horse was so fractious that it was 
impossible. As the night was very dark we could not tell when the 
last buffalo passed. We were terribly frightened, for it was supposed 
that the Indians were following the herd. The buffaloes passed 
and went on to the coast, and the prairie looked afterwards as if it 
had been plowed. 3 

We had been several days without any news from the army, and 
did not know but that our men had been massacred. News was 
carried at that time by a man or boy going from one neighborhood 
to another. We had heard that the Convention had passed a decla- 

2 These reports were, of course, untrue. 

3 This was the last time that buffaloes in large numbers were seen in this 
part of Texas; but for some years a few ranged on Mustang and Chocolate 
Bayous, and a Mr. Hill, of Grimes county, had several running with his cattle 
as late as the early 4o’s.— Adele B. Looscan. 


THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


325 


ration of independence, and elected David G. Burnet president, and 
Sam Houston commander-in-chief of the army. On the 12th of 
March came the news of the fall of the Alamo. A courier brought 
a dispatch from General Houston for the people to leave. Colonel 
Travis and the men under his command had been slaughtered, the 
Texas army was retreating, and President Burnet’s cabinet had gone 
to Harrisburg. 

Then began the horrors of the “Runaway Scrape.” We left home 
at sunset, hauling clothes, bedding, and provisions on the sleigh with 
one yoke of oxen. Mother and I were walking, she with an infant 
in her arms. Brother drove the oxen, and my two little sisters rode 
in the sleigh. We were going ten miles to where we could be trans¬ 
ferred to Mr. Bundick’s cart. Father was helping with the cattle, but 
he joined us after dark and brought a horse and saddle for brother. 
He sent him to help Mr. Stafford with the cattle. He was to go a 
different road with them and ford the San Jacinto. Mother and I 
then rode father’s horse. 

We met Mrs. M-. She was driving her oxen home. We had 

sent her word in the morning. She begged mother to go back and 
help her, but father said not. He told the lady to drive the oxen 
home, put them in the cow pen, turn out the cows and calves, and 
get her children ready, and he would send assistance. 

We went on to Mrs. Roark’s, and met five families ready to leave. 
Two of Mr. Shipman’s sons arrived that night. They were mere boys, 
and had come to help their parents. They didn’t go on home; father 
knew that Mr. Shipman’s family had gone that morning, so he sent 
them back for Mrs. M—’s. 

It was ten o’clock at night when we got to Mrs. Roark’s. We 
shifted our things into the cart of Mr. Bundick, who was waiting 
for us, and tried to rest till morning. Sister and I had been weep¬ 
ing all day about Colonel Travis. When we started from home we 
got the little books he had given us and would have taken them with 
us, but mother said it was best to leave them. 

Early next morning we were on the move, mother with her four 
children in the cart, and Mr. Bundick and his wife and negro woman 
on horseback. He had been in bad health for some time and had just 
got home from visiting his mother, who lived in Louisiana. He 
brought with him two slaves, the woman already mentioned and a 
man who was driving the cart; and, as Mr. Bundick had no chil¬ 
dren, we were as comfortable as could have been expected. 

We had to leave the sleigh. Sister and I had grieved all the day 
before about Colonel Travis, and had a big cry when our brother 
left us. We were afraid Mrs. M— would be left at home. We had 
a fresh outburst of grief when the sleigh was abandoned, but had the 
satisfaction of seeing Mrs. M— and her children. 

Mr. Cotie would not go to the army. He hauled five families in 


326 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the big blue wagon with his six yoke of oxen, besides negroes, pro¬ 
visions, bedding, and all the plunder the others could not carry. 

March, 1836 .—The Runaway Scrape 

We camped the first night near Harrisburg, about where the rail¬ 
road depot now stands. Next day we crossed Vince’s Bridge and 
arrived at the San Jacinto in the night. There were fully five thou¬ 
sand people at the ferry. The planters from Brazoria and Columbia 
with their slaves were crossing. We waited three days before we 
crossed. Our party consisted of five white families: father’s, Mr. 
Dyer’s, Mr. Bell’s, Mr. Neal’s, and Mr. Bundick’s. Father and Mr. 
Bundick were the only white men in the party, the others being in 
the army. There were twenty or thirty negroes from Stafford’s plan¬ 
tation. They had a large wagon with five yoke of oxen, and horses, 
and mules, and they were in charge of an old negro man called Uncle 
Ned. Altogether, black and white, there were about fifty of us. Every 
one was trying to cross first, and it was almost a riot. 

We got over the third day, and after travelling a few miles came 
to a big prairie. It was about twelve miles further to the next tim¬ 
ber and water, and some of our party wanted to camp; but others 
said that the Trinity river was rising, and if we delayed we might 
not get across. So we hurried on. 

When we got about half across the prairie Uncle Ned’s wagon 
bogged. The negro men driving the carts tried to go around the 
big wagon one at a time until the four carts were fast in the mud. 
Mother was the only white woman that rode in a cart; the others 
travelled on horseback. Mrs. Bell’s four children, Mrs. Dyer’s three, 
and mother’s four rode in the carts. All that were on horseback had 
gone on to the timber to let their horses feed and get water. They 
supposed their families would get there by dark. The negro men 
put all the oxen to the wagon, but could not move it; so they had 
to stay there until morning without wood or water. Mother gath¬ 
ered the white children in our cart. They behaved very well and 
went to sleep, except one little boy, Eli Dyer, who kicked and cried 
for Uncle Ned and Aunt Dilue till Uncle Ned came and carried him 
to the wagon. He slept that night in Uncle Ned’s arms. 

Mother with all the negro women and children walked six miles 
to the timber and found our friends in trouble. Father and Mr. Bun¬ 
dick had gone to the river and helped with the ferry boat, but late 
in the evening the boat grounded on the east bank of the Trinity and 
didn’t get back until morning. While they were gone the horses 
had strayed off and they had to find them before they could go to 
the wagons. Those that travelled on horseback were supplied with 
provisions by other campers. We that stayed in the prairie had to 
eat cold corn bread and cold boiled beef. The wagons and carts 


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didn’t get to the timber till night. They had to be unloaded and 
pulled out. 

March, 1836 .—Crossing the Trinity River 

At the Trinity river men from the army began to join their 
families. I know they have been blamed for this, but what else could 
they have done? The Texas army was retreating and the Mexicans 
were crossing the Colorado, Col. Fannin and his men were prisoners, 
there were more negroes than whites among us and many of them 
were wild Africans, there was a large tribe of Indians on the Trinity 
as well as the Cherokee Indians in Eastern Texas at Nacogdoches, 
and there were tories, both Mexicans and Americans, in the country. 
It was the intention of our men to see their families across the Sabine 
river, and then to return and fight the Mexicans. I must say for the 
negroes that there was no insubordination among them; they were 
loyal to their owners. 

Our hardships began at the Trinity. The river was rising and 
there was a struggle to see who should cross first. Measles, sore 
eyes, whooping cough, and every other disease that man, woman or 
child is heir to, broke out among us. Our party now consisted of the 
five white families I first mentioned, and Mr. Adam Stafford’s 
negroes. We had separated from Mrs. M— and other friends at 
Vince’s bridge. 

The horrors of crossing the Trinity are beyond my power to 
describe. One of my little sisters was very sick, and the ferryman 
said that those families that had sick children should cross first. 
When our party got to the boat the water broke over the banks above 
where we were and ran around us. We were several hours sur¬ 
rounded by water. Our family was the last to get to the boat. We 
left more than five hundred people on the west bank. Drift wood 
covered the water as far as we could see. The sick child was in 
convulsions. It required eight men to manage the boat. 

When we landed the lowlands were under water, and everybody 
was rushing for the prairie. Father had a good horse, and Mrs. Dyer 
let mother have her horse and saddle. Father carried the sick child, 
and sister and I rode behind mother. She carried father’s gun and 
the little babe. All we carried with us was what clothes we were 
wearing at the time. The night was very dark. We crossed a bridge 
that was under water. As soon as we crossed, a man with a cart 
and oxen drove on the bridge, and it broke down, drowning the oxen. 
That prevented the people from crossing, as the bridge was over a 
slough that looked like a river. 

Father and mother hurried on, and we got to the prairie and found 
a great many families camped there. A Mrs. Foster invited mother 
to her camp, and furnished us with supper, a bed, and dry clothes. 

The other families stayed all night in the bottom without fire or 


328 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


anything to eat, and with the water up in the carts. The men drove 
the horses and oxen to the prairies, and the women, sick children, 
and negroes were left in the bottom. The old negro man, Uncle 
Ned, was left in charge. He put the white women and children in 
his wagon. It was large and had a canvas cover. The negro women 
and their children he put in the carts. Then he guarded the whole 
party until morning. 

It was impossible for the men to return to their families. They 
spent the night making a raft by torch light. As the camps were 
near a grove of pine timber, there was no trouble about lights. It 
was a night of terror. Father and the men worked some distance 
from the camp cutting down timber to make the raft. It had to be 
put together in the water. We were in great anxiety about the 
people that were left in the bottom; we didn’t know but they would 
be drowned, or killed by panthers, alligators, or bears. 

As soon as it was daylight the men went to the relief of their 
families and found them cold, wet, and hungry. Many of the fami¬ 
lies that were water bound I didn’t know; but there were among 
them Mr. Bell’s three children, and Mrs. Dyer and her sister, Mrs. 
Neal, with five children. Mr. Bundick’s wife had given out the first 
day that we arrived at the river. Her health was delicate, and as 
she and her husband had friends living near Liberty they went 
to their house. When the men on the raft got to those who had 
stayed all night in the Trinity bottom they found that the negroes 
were scared, and wanted to get on the raft; but Uncle Ned told 
them that his young mistress and the children should go first. It 
was very dangerous crossing the slough. The men would bring one 
woman and her children on the raft out of deep water, and men on 
horseback would meet them. It took all day to get the party out 
to the prairies. The men had to carry cooked provisions to them. 
The second day they brought out the bedding and clothes. Every¬ 
thing was soaked with water. They had to take the wagon and carts 
apart. The Stafford wagon was the last one brought out. Uncle 
Ned stayed in the wagon until everything was landed on the prairie. 
It took four days to get everything out of the water. 

The man whose oxen were drowned sold his cart to father for 
ten dollars. He said that the had seen enough of Mexico and would 
go back to old Ireland. 

It had been five days since we crossed the Trinity, and we had 
heard no news from the army. The town of Liberty was three miles 
from where we camped. The people there had not left their homes, 
and they gave us all the help in their power. My little sister that 
had been sick died and was buried in the cemetery at Liberty. After 
resting a few days our party continued their journey, but we remained 
in the town. Mother was not able to travel; she had nursed an 
infant and the sick child until she was compelled to rest. 


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A few days after our friends had gone a man crossed the Trinity 
in a skiff bringing bad news. The Mexican army had crossed the 
Brazos and was between the Texas army and Harrisburg. Fannin 
and his men were massacred. President Burnet and his cabinet had 
left Harrisburg and gone to Washington on the bay and were going 
to Galveston Island. The people at Liberty had left. There were 
many families west of the Trinity, among them our nearest neigh¬ 
bors, Mrs. Roark and Mrs. M—. 

April, 1836 .—The Battle of San Jacinto 

We had been at Liberty three weeks. A Mr. Martin let father 
use his house. There were two families camped near, those of Mr. 
Bright and his son-in-law, Patrick Reels, from the Colorado river. 
One Thursday evening all of a sudden we heard a sound like distant 
thunder. When it was repeated father said it was cannon, and that 
the Texans and Mexicans were fighting. He had been through the 
war of 1812, and knew it was a battle. The cannonading lasted only 
a few minutes, and father said that the Texans must have been 
defeated, or the cannon would not have ceased firing so quickly. We 
left Liberty in half an hour. The reports of the cannon were so 
distant that father was under the impression that the fighting was 
near the Trinity. The river was ten miles wide at Liberty. 

We travelled nearly all night, sister and I on horseback and mother 
in the cart. Father had two yoke of oxen now. One yoke belonged 
to Adam Stafford and had strayed and father found them. The 
extra yoke was a great help as the roads were very boggy. We rested 
a few hours to let the stock feed. Mr. Bright and two families 
were with us. We were as wretched as we could be; for we had 
been five weeks from home, and there was not much prospect of 
our ever returning. We had not heard a word from brother or the 
other boys that were driving the cattle. Mother was sick, and we 
had buried our dear little sister at Liberty. 

We continued our journey through mud and water and when we 
camped in the evening fifty or sixty young men came by who were 
going to join General Houston. One of them was Harvey Stafford, 
our neighbor, who was returning from the United States with vol¬ 
unteers. Father told them there had been fighting, and he informed 
them that they could not cross the Trinity at Liberty. They brought 
some good news from our friends. Mr. Stafford had met his sisters, 
Mrs. Dyer, and Mrs. Neal. He said there had been a great deal of 
sickness, but no deaths. He said also that General Gaines of the 
United States army was at the Neches with a regiment of soldiers 
to keep the Indians in subjection, but didn’t prevent the people from 
crossing with their slaves. General Gaines said the boundary line 
between the United States and Mexico was the Neches. 


330 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


The young men went a short distance from us and camped. Then 
we heard some one calling in the direction of Liberty. We could 
see a man on horseback waving his hat; and, as we knew there was 
no one left at Liberty, we thought the Mexican army had crossed 
the Trinity. The young men came with their guns, and when the 
rider got near enough for us to understand what he said, it was 
“Turn back! The Texans have whipped the Mexican army and the 
Mexicans are prisoners. No danger! No danger! Turn back!” 
When he got to the camp he could scarcely speak he was so excited 
and out of breath. When the young men began to understand the 
glorious news they wanted to fire a salute, but father made them stop. 
He told them to save their ammunition, for they might need it. 

Father asked the man for an explanation, and he showed a des¬ 
patch from General Houston giving an account of the battle and 
saying it would be safe for the people to return to their homes. 
The courier had crossed the Trinity River in a canoe, swimming his 
horse with the help of two men. He had left the battlefield the next 
day after the fighting. He said that General Houston was wounded, 
and that General Santa Anna had not been captured. 

The good news was cheering indeed. The courier’s name was 
McDermot. He was an Irishman and had been an actor. He stayed 
with us that night and told various incidents of the battle. There 
was not much sleeping during the night. Mr. McDermot said that 
he had not slept in a week. He not only told various incidents of 
the retreat of the Texas army, but acted them. The first time that 
mother laughed after the death of my little sister was at his descrip¬ 
tion of General Houston’s helping to get a cannon out of a bog. 


April, 1836 .—On the way hack Home 

We were on the move early the next morning. The courier went 
on to carry the glad tidings to the people who had crossed the Sabine, 
but we took a lower road and went down the Trinity. We crossed 
the river in a flat boat. When Mr. McDermot left us the young 
men fired a salute. Then they travelled with us until they crossed 
the river. 

We staid one night at a Mr. Lawrence’s, where there were a great 
many families. Mrs. James Perry was there. She had not gone east 
of the Trinity. Her husband, Captain James Perry, was in the 
army. Mrs. Perry was a sister of Stephen F. Austin. My parents 
knew them in Missouri. She had a young babe and a pretty little 
daughter named Emily. 

After crossing the river we had a disagreeable time cross¬ 
ing the bay. It had been raining two days and nights. There was 


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a bayou to cross over which there was no bridge, and the only way 
to pass was to go three miles through the bay to get around the 
mouth of the bayou. There were guide-posts to point out the way, 
but it was very dangerous. If we got near the mouth of the bayou 
there was quicksand. If the wind rose the waves rolled high. 

The bayou was infested with alligators. A few days before our 
family arrived at the bay a Mr. King was caught by one and carried 
under water. He was going east with his family. He swam his 
horses across the mouth of the bayou, and then he swam back to 
the west side and drove the cart into the bay. His wife and children 
became frightened, and he turned back and said he would go up the 
river and wait for the water to subside. He got his family back on 
land, and swam the bayou to bring back the horses. He had gotten 
nearly across with them, when a large alligator appeared. Mrs. King 
first saw it above water and screamed. The alligator struck her 
husband with its tail and he went under water. There were several 
men present, and they fired their guns at the animal, but it did no 
good. It was not in their power to rescue Mr. King. The men waited 
several days and then killed a beef, put a quarter on the bank, fast¬ 
ened it with a chain, and then watched it until the alligator came out, 
when they shot and killed it. This happened several days before 
the battle. 

We passed the bayou without any trouble or accident, except the 
loss of my sunbonnet. It blew off as we reached the shore. The 
current was very swift at the mouth of the bayou. Father wanted 
to swim in and get it for me, but mother begged him not to go in 
the water, so I had the pleasure of seeing it float away. I don’t 
remember the name of the bayou, but a little town called Wallace 
was opposite across the bay. We saw the big dead alligator, and we 
were glad to leave the Trinity. 

Father’s horse had strayed, but we wouldn’t stop to find it. He 
said when he got home he would go back and hunt for it. 


April, 1836 .—On the San Jacinto Battle Field 

We arrived at Lynchburg in the night. There we met several 
families that we knew, and among them was our neighbor, Mrs. 
M-. She had travelled with Moses Shipman’s family. 

We crossed the San Jacinto the next morning, and stayed until 
late in the evening on the battle field. Both armies were camped 
near. General Santa Anna had been captured. There was great 
rejoicing at the meeting of friends. Mr. Leo Roark was in the 
battle. He had met his mother’s family the evening before. He 
came to the ferry just as we landed, and it was like seeing a brother. 



332 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


He asked mother to go with him to the camp to see General Santa 
Anna and the Mexican prisoners. She would not go, because, as 
she said, she was not dressed for visiting; but she gave sister and 
me permission to go to the camp. I had lost my bonnet crossing 
Trinity Bay and was compelled to wear a table cloth again. It 
was six weeks since we had left home, and our clothes were very 
much dilapidated. I could not go to see the Mexican prisoners with 
a table cloth tied on my head for I knew several of the young men. 
I was on the battle field of San Jacinto the 26th of April, 1836. The 
28th was the anniversary of my birth. I was eleven years old. 

We stayed on the battle field several hours. Father was helping 
with the ferry boat. We visited the graves of the Texans that were 
killed in the battle, but there were none of them that I knew. The 
dead Mexicans were lying around in every direction. 

Mother was very uneasy about Uncle James Wells, who was miss¬ 
ing. Mr. Roark said uncle had been sent two days before the battle 
with Messrs. Church Fulcher, and Wash Secrest to watch General 
Cos. They had gone to Stafford’s Point, and were chased by the 
Mexicans and separated. Fulcher and Secrest returned before the 
battle. Mr. Roark says the burning of Vince’s bridge prevented 
several of the scouts from getting back. 


April, 1836 .—Leaving the San Jacinto Battle Ground 

Father worked till the middle of the afternoon helping with the 
ferry boat, and then he visited the camp. He did not see General 
Santa Anna, but met some old friends he had known in Missouri. 
We left the battle field late in the evening. We had to pass among 
the dead Mexicans, and father pulled one out of the road, so we 
could get by without driving over the body, since we could not go 
around it. The prairie was very boggy, it was getting dark, and 
there were now twenty or thirty families with us. We were glad to 
leave the battle field, for it was a grewsome sight. We camped that 
night on the prairie, and could hear the wolves howl and bark as they 
devoured the dead. 

We met Mr. Kuykendall’s family from Fort Bend, now Rich¬ 
mond. Their hardships had been greater than ours. They had stayed 
at home and had had no idea that the Mexican army was near. 
One day the negro ferryman was called in English, and he carried 
the boat across. On the other side he found the Mexicans, who took 
possession of the boat and embarked as many soldiers as it could 
carry. While they were crossing some one said it was Captain Wiley 
Martin’s company. They knew he was above, near San Felipe, and 
men, women, and children ran down the river bank expecting to 
meet their friends; but just as the boat landed the negro ferryman 


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called out, “Mexicans!” There were three or four families of the 
Kuykendall’s, and they ran for the bottom. Mrs. Abe Kuykendall 
had a babe in her arms. She ran a short distance and then thought 
about her little girl and went back. She saw her husband take the 
child from the nurse, and she afterwards said she was then the hap¬ 
piest woman in the world. 

One old gentleman ran back to the house, got his money, went 
through a potato patch and buried it. The money was silver and 
was so heavy he could not carry it away. One young married woman 
with a babe in her arms ran into a big field and followed the party 
that was on the outside. The fence was high, and they had now 
gotten out of sight of the Mexicans, so the woman’s husband came 
to the fence, and she gave him the child. He told her to climb 
over, but she turned and ran in a different direction. Her husband 
followed the other families. They stayed that night in a cane-brake 
without anything to eat, and the children suffered terribly. The next 
day they made their way to Harrisburg and got assistance. They 
were at Lynchburg during the battle, and were helped by General 
Houston, and furnished means to get back home. 

Mrs. Abe Kuykendall nursed the child that had been left by its 
mother. She said they had heard from the mother. She had gone 
through the field and got out, and had gone twenty miles down the 
river to Henry Jones’ ferry, where she fell in with some people she 
knew. She thought her husband and friends would go there. She 
was alone the first day and night, and the next day she got to Henry 
Jones’. 

Early the next morning we were on the move. We had to take 
a roundabout road, for the burning of Vince’s bridge prevented us 
from going directly home. We could hear nothing but sad news. 
San Felipe had been burned, and dear old Harrisburg was in ashes. 
There was nothing left of the Stafford plantation but a crib with a 
thousand bushels of corn. The Mexicans turned the houses at the 
Point into a hospital. They knew that it was a place where political 
meetings had been held. 

Leo Roark told father while we were in the camps that he was 
confident Colonel Almonte, General Santa Anna’s aide-de-camp, was 
the Mexican that had the horses for sale in our neighborhood the 
fourth of July, ’34. Father could not get to see Colonel Almonte, 
for he was anxious to get us away from the battle ground before 
night. 

The burning of the saw mill at Harrisburg and the buildings on 
Stafford’s plantation was a calamity that greatly affected the people. 
On the plantation there were a sugar-mill, cotton-gin, blacksmith-shop, 
grist-mill, a dwelling-house, negro houses, and a stock of farming im¬ 
plements. The Mexicans saved the corn for bread, and it was a great 
help to the people of the neighborhood. 


334 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


April, 1836 .—Going Home after the Battle 

We camped that evening on Sims’ Bayou. We met men with 
Mexicans going to the army, and heard from Brother Granville. 
Mr. Adam Stafford had got home with the boys, and they were all 
well. We heard that the cotton that the farmers had hauled to the 
Brazos with the expectation of shipping it to Brazoria on the steamer 
Yellowstone, then at Washington, was safe. Father said if he got 
his cotton to market I should have two or three sun-bonnets, as 
he was tired of seeing me wearing a table-cloth around my head. 

We heard that Uncle James Wells was at Stafford’s Point. He 
made a narrow escape from being captured by the Mexicans. When 
he and Messrs. Secrest and Fulcher were run into the bottom, his 
horse ran against a tree and fell down, and uncle was badly hurt. 
He lost his horse and gun. He went into the bottom. He saw the 
houses burning on the Stafford plantation. As he was overseer 
there when he joined the army at the time when Colonel Travis called 
for assistance, it was like his home. General Cos marched on the 
next day, but left a strong guard at the Point. 

While mother was talking about Uncle James, he and Deaf Smith 
rode up to our camp. It was a happy surprise. Uncle James’s shoul¬ 
der was very lame. The night after he lost his horse and gun he 
crawled inside the Mexican line and captured a horse and saddle. 

He then went into the bottom at Mrs. M-.’s house, where he 

found corn and bacon and a steel mill for grinding the corn. His arm 
was so lame he could not grind corn, so he ate fried eggs and bacon. 
He had been to our house, and he said everything we left on the place 
had been destroyed. He watched on the prairie that night till he saw 
so many Mexican fugitives wandering about that he knew there had 
been a battle. He met Deaf Smith and other men sent by General 
Houston to carry a dispatch from Santa Anna to Filisola. Deaf Smith 
told uncle all about the battle, and said he had captured General Cos 
the next day six miles south of Stafford’s Point. Cos had a fine 
china pitcher full of water and one ear of corn. He carried Cos to 
the Point, where he got a horse, and then took him back to the San 
Jacinto battle ground. He left the fine pitcher at the Point, and he 
gave it to Uncle James. Uncle stayed there till Mr. Smith returned 
from Filisola’s camp with an answer to Santa Anna’s dispatch. 

Mr. Smith could speak Spanish. He said that when he cap¬ 
tured General Cos, whom he did not know, he asked him if he had 
been in the battle. On being answered in the affirmative, he asked 
him if he had been a prisoner. General Cos replied that he had not, 
but that he escaped after dark the evening of the battle, and that he 
abandoned his horse at the burnt bridge. Smith then asked him 
if he had seen General Cos, and he said that he had not. Smith con- 


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tinued: “I am Deaf Smith, and I want to find General Cos. He 
offered one thousand dollars for my head, and if I can find him I will 
cut off his head and send it to Mexico.” When they arrived at the 
battle ground he was very much surprised to find his prisoner was 
General Cos. He took the horse and saddle back to Uncle James, 
and gave him the fine pitcher, and when we got home uncle gave the 
pitcher to mother. 

Father examined uncle’s shoulder, and said there were no bones 
broken, and that he would be well in three or four weeks. Mother 
had some of Uncle James’ clothing. She trimmed his hair, and made 
him go to the bayou, bathe, and put on clean clothes. All our soldiers 
were dirty and ragged. As Uncle James had fever, mother wanted 
him to go home with her, but he would not. He said that he had 
been absent from the army ten days, and must report to headquarters. 

Deaf Smith was very anxious to get back to the army. He was 
dark and looked like a Mexican. He was dressed in buckskin and 
said that he would be ashamed to be seen in a white shirt. He said 
that Uncle James would be taken for a tory or a stay-at-home. 

Deaf Smith was the man that helped burn the Vince bridge. He 
said if the bridge had not been destroyed, General Filisola would 
have heard of Santa Anna’s defeat and would have marched to his 
assistance, as he was not more than thirty miles from the battle 
ground. General Urrea was also on the west bank of the Brazos 
river with a division of the Mexican army. When the first fugitives 
from the battle field arrived at the headquarters of Filisola, he did 
not believe their report, but when others came with the horrid tidings, 
he became convinced. The Mexican fugitives gave such a dreadful 
account of Santa Anna’s fall that General Filisola, when Deaf Smith 
arrived, was preparing to cross the river to join General Urrea. 

Mr. Smith left our camp before daylight. Uncle James Wells 
stayed with us until we were ready to start home. He was sick all 
night, and father gave him medicine and bound up his arm. 

General Santa Anna was captured the next day after the battle. 
He was seen by Captain Karnes to plunge into the bayou on a fine 
black horse. He made his escape from the battle ground on Allen 
Vince’s horse, but not on the fine saddle. The horse went home 
carrying a common saddle. He was taken to headquarters and after 
a few days was restored to Allen Vince. James Brown went to 
General Sherman and pointed out the horse. General Santa Anna 
was captured by James A. Silvester, Washington Secrest, and Sion 
Bostick. A Mr. Cole was the first man that got to Santa Anna. He 
was hid in the grass, was dirty and wet, and was dressed as a common 
soldier. He rode to the camps behind Mr. Robinson. The men had 
no idea that they had Santa Anna a prisoner till the Mexicans began 
to say in their own language, “the president.” 


336 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


April 30, 1836 .—Going Home. Mrs. Brown’s Family 

We stayed one day on Sims’ Bayou. There were more than one 
hundred families, and all stopped to rest and let the stock feed. We 
met a Mrs. Brown 1 who was living at William Vince’s when the 
Mexican army crossed the bridge. They took possession of Allen 
Vince’s fine black horse. Mrs. Brown’s son James, a lad aged thir¬ 
teen, went and mounted the horse and would not give him up. The 
Mexicans made the boy a prisoner. His mother came out and asked 
for General Santa Anna. Colonel Almonte came out and asked in 
English what he could do for her. She told him she was a subject of 
the king of England, and demanded protection. Almonte assured 
her that she and her children would not be hurt, and ordered her son 
to be liberated. Santa Anna’s servant put a fine saddle on the horse. 
It was ornamented with gold, and had solid gold stirrups. When the 
captured plunder was sold at auction, the Texas soldiers bid it in and 
presented it to General Houston. Mrs. Brown stayed at Mr. William 
Vince’s till after the battle. We met some English friends from Co¬ 
lumbia that were going home. The Adkinses that lived in our neigh¬ 
borhood were relatives of Mrs. Brown. We met the pretty English 
girl, Jenny Adkins. She was married and was the mother of two 
children. 


April 30, 1836.— Home, Sweet Home 

We camped one day and two nights on Sims’ Bayou. We had 
traveled since the twenty-first, without resting, half the time in mud 
and water. It was only fifteen miles home. 

Early in the morning we broke camp. We were alone; the other 
families lived farther down the country. The weather was getting 
warm, and we stopped two hours in the middle of the day at a water 
hole. When the sun set we were still five miles from home. 

We overtook our nearest neighbor, Mrs. M-. She had left 

Sims’ Bayou that morning with the Shipman family, but had sepa¬ 
rated from them, saying she could find the way home. One of her 
oxen got down, and she could neither get it up nor get the yoke off 
the other ox. When we drove up she had her four children on her 
horse and was going to walk to our house. She knew that we had 
started home that morning. If we had not stopped two hours we 
should have been with her about the middle of the afternoon. 
Father unyoked her oxen, and turned loose one of his that was broken 

1 Mrs. Brown was a Scotch woman. Her son, James K. Brown, afterwards 
became a prominent merchant of Galveston. He never married, and has been 
dead many years. A daughter Jessie married a Mr. Wade and lived in St. 
Louis.— Adele B. Looscan. 

Mrs. Harris adds a note to the effect that Mrs. Brown gave a description 
of the fine saddle and recounted the story of the burning of the bridge. 



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down and put the other along with Mrs. M-’s stronger ox to her 

cart. It was now dark and we traveled slower. The oxen were tired 

and kept feeding all the time. One of Mrs. M-’s daughters and 

I rode her horse; it was a great relief to me, for I was tired of riding 
in the cart. 

It was ten o’clock when we got home. We camped near the 
house. 

Sunday morning, May i, 1836 .—Home 

Father said we could not go in until morning. Uncle James told 
mother that the floor had been torn up by the Mexicans in searching 
for eggs. He would have put the house in order, but his shoulder 
and arm were so painful he could not work. 

As soon as it was light enough for us to see we went to the house, 
and the first thing we saw was the hogs running out. Father’s book¬ 
case lay on the ground broken open, his books, medicines, and other 
things scattered on the ground, and the hogs sleeping on them. When 

Mrs. M-’s children, sister and I got to the door, there was one 

big hog that would not go out till father shot at him. Then we chil¬ 
dren began picking up the books. We could not find those that 
Colonel Travis gave us, but did find broken toys that belonged to 
our dear little sister that died. Through the joy and excitement since 
the battle of San Jacinto, we had forgotten our sad bereavement. 

The first thing that father did after breakfast was to go to the 
corn field. He had planted corn the first of March, and it needed 
plowing. He did not wait for Monday, or to put the house in order, 
but began plowing at once. His field was in the bottom, and he had 
hidden his plow. 

Mother said I should ride Mrs. M-’s horse, and go to Staf¬ 

ford’s Point and bring Brother Granville home. I did not want to 
go. Sister said that I could wear her bonnet. My dress was very 
much the worse for wear. It was pinned up the back, my shoes 
were down at the heels, and my stockings were dirty. I was greatly 
embarrassed, for I knew all the boys were at the Point. I did all 
the primping that the circumstances would permit, plaiting my hair, 
etc. I had had my face wrapped in a table cloth till it was thoroughly 
blanched. When I got to the Point there were more than one hundred 
people there, men, women, children, negroes, and Mexicans. Many 
of the Mexicans were sick and wounded; I had never seen such a 
dirty and ragged crowd. The boys were without shoes and hats, and 
their hair was down to their shoulders. After I had met them I did 
not feel ashamed of my appearance. Brother got his horse, and we 
went home. 

I was not near the burnt buildings; the plantation was in the bot¬ 
tom, on Oyster Creek. The Stafford family used the house at the 
Point for a summer residence; and, as they brought their negroes 


338 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


out of the bottom in the summer, there were a good many houses at 
the Point. 

When brother and I got home we found mother and Mrs. M- 

at the wash tub. I was shocked, for mother had always kept the 
Sabbath. At noon father and brother put down the floor, Mrs. 
M-’s girls and I scoured it, and we moved in. 

Mrs. M- took a bucket and went back to give water to her 

sick oxen, but found the ox dead. Brother Granville helped her to 
move home that evening. 

Mother was very despondent, but father was hopeful. He said 
Texas would gain her independence and become a great nation. 

Uncle James Wells came home with two Mexicans for servants, 
and put them to work in the corn field. There was now a scarcity 
of bread. The people came back in crowds, stopping at Harrisburg 
and in our neighborhood. A colony of Irish that had left San Patricio 
in February stopped at Stafford’s Point. 

Father had hid some of our things in the bottom, among them 
a big chest. Mother had packed it with bedding, clothes, and other 
things we could not take when we left home. After a few days, 
Uncle and brother hauled it to the house, and that old blue chest 
proved a treasure. When we left home we wore our best clothes. 
Now our best clothes were in the chest, among them my old sun- 
bonnet. I was prouder of that old bonnet than in after years of a 
new white lace one that my husband gave me. 

By the middle of May our neighbors that we had parted from 
came home. They had got to the Sabine River before they heard 
of the battle of San Jacinto. 

Father and the men that had cotton on the banks of the Brazos 
went to the river to build a flat boat to ship their cotton to Brazoria. 
Mother said that it would be best for them to wait a few days, but 
they would not stop. They said that as they had been camping for 
two months it would make them sick to sleep in a house. Uncle 
James stayed with us. He had several bales of cotton, but was not 
able to work. He looked after our Mexicans and helped the women 
in the neighborhood to get their corn worked. They all got Mexicans, 
but it required an overseer to make them work. 

There was no prospect of a cotton crop in our neighborhood. The 
people had been very short of provisions, and there would have been 
suffering among them if the citizens of New Orleans had not sent a 
schooner load to Harrisburg. The provisions were distributed without 
cost. 

There was considerable talk of a new town’s being started on 
Buffalo Bayou about ten miles above Harrisburg by the Allen brothers. 
They wanted to buy out the Harris claim at Harrisburg, but the 
Harris brothers would not sell. 




THE SAN JACINTO CAMPAIGN 


339 


June, 1836 .—Shipping Cotton on a Flathoat 

The first of June the men sent word that they had the cotton 
on a boat ready to start, and that Uncle Ned should be sent with the 
Stafford’s wagon to bring home family supplies. It was more than 
fifty miles by land, but a long and dangerous route by water. 

The new town laid out by the Allens was named Houston, in 
honor of General Houston. There were circulars and drawings 
sent out, which represented a large city, showing churches, a court¬ 
house, a market house and a square of ground set aside to use for 
a building for Congress, if the seat of government should be 
located there. 




PART II 

REPUBLIC AND STATE, 1836-1928 




CONTENTS 


PART II 

CHAPTER PAGE 

XXVII. A Survey of the Home Affairs of the Republic. 

By Eugene C. Barker. 345 

XXVIII. A Survey of the Foreign Affairs of the Republic. 

By Eugene C. Barker. 349 

XXIX. The Last Stage of the Annexation of Texas by the United 

States. . By Annie Middleton. 375 

1. Recognition by the United States. 375 

2. The Texan Offer of Annexation. 376 

3. Negotiation of the Annexation Treaty. 377 

4. The Joint Resolution for Annexation. 378 

5. Donelson’s Mission to Texas. 379 

6. Efforts of the French and English to Defeat Annexation.380 

7. The Convening of the Texan Congress. 381 

8. The Calling of the Convention. 382 

9. Mexico Agrees to Recognize Texas. 385 

10. Rejection of Mexican Recognition. 387 

11. The Convention Accepts Annexation.389 

XXX. East Texas in the Politics of the Republic. 

By George L. Crockett. 394 

XXXI. The Settlement of the Public Debt of the Republic. 

By E. W. Winkler. 405 

XXXII. The Finances of Texas, 1846-1861. By Edmund T. Miller. 409 

1. The State, 1846-1861. 409 

2. Expenditures. 411 

XXXIII. The History of a Texas Slave Plantation. By Abigail Curlee 417 

1. Description of Agriculture in Texas, 1831-1836. 417 

2. Life on the Plantation. 4 21 

3. Cotton Picking Record. 439 

4. Perry’s Journal of 1848. 44 1 

XXXIV. The Secession Movement in Texas. .By Charles W. Ramsdell. 452 
XXXV. Growth of the Secession Movement. By Anna Irene Sandbo. 459 

1. The Gubernatorial Campaign of 1859. 459 

2. The Legislature on the South Carolina Resolutions. 463 

3. Texas on the Eve of the Civil War. 466 

XXXVI The First Session of the Secession Convention in Texas 

By Anna Irene Sandbo. 476 
XXXVII. Texas During the Civil War. By Charles W. Ramsdell. 486 


343 
























344 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

XXXVIII. 


XXXIX. 

XL. 

XLI. 


XLII. 


XLIII. 

XLIV. 

XLV. 

XLVI. 

XLVII. 

XLVIII. 


PAGE 

Texas from the Fall of the Confederacy to the Beginning 
of Reconstruction. By Charles W. Ramsdell. 490 

1. Conditions on the Eve of the Break-up. 490 

2. The Break-up and the Surrender. 493 

3. The Cotton Troubles. 499 

4. The Negro Question and Labor Troubles. 499 

The Reconstruction Period, 1865-1874. .By Dudley G. Wooten. 506 
The Grange as a Political Factor in Texas. 

By Roscoe C. Martin. 514 
The Economic History of Texas, 1865-1915 By Edmund T. Miller 527 

1. The Reconstruction Period, 1865-1874. 527 

2. The Period of Recovery, 1874-1880. 530 

3. The Period of 1881-1915. 532 

4. Problems of State Finance. 534 

Transportation in Texas. By Charles S. Potts. 540 

1. Conditions before the Coming of the Railways. 546 

2. The Development of the Railway Net. 551 

3. Public Aid to Railway Construction. 566 

Some Aspects of the History of West and Northwest Texas 

Since 1845. By R. C. Crane. 581 

The Texas Rangers. By Walter P. Webb. 592 

Life on a Typical Texas Ranch. By Harley True Burton. 599 

Managing a Trail Herd. By Charles Goodnight. 612 

The Development of Agriculture in West Texas. 


By W. C. Holden. 618 

Suggestions for the Study and Writing of Local History. 

By Walter P. Webb. 633 


Book List. 641 

Index... 645 





















CHAPTER XXVII 

A SURVEY OF THE HOME AFFAIRS OF THE REPUBLIC 

By Eugene C. Barker 

[This survey of the domestic history of the Republic of Texas is from the 
editor’s edition of Johnson’s Texas and Texans . With the following chapter, 
it supplies the narrative thread of Texas history from 1836 to 1846. It can 
be supplemented by numerous special studies on particular topics of the period. 
Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapter XIX; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School 
History of Texas, 143—168; Miller, A Financial History of Texas (University 
of Texas Bulletin), 9—28; Winkler, “The Seat of Government of Texas, in 
The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, X, 141-171, 185-245; 
Muckleroy, “The Indian, Policy of the Republic of Texas,” in Southwestern 
Historical Quarterly, XXV, 229-260, XXVI, 1-29, 128-148, 184-206.] 

The domestic history of the Republic may be briefly summarized. 
President Burnet’s administration was inaugurated at the gloomiest 
moment of the war. The Alamo had fallen, and Santa Anna’s main 
division was advancing toward the heart of the colonies; Urrea, after 
destroying Johnson and Grant’s forces, was pushing toward Fannin 
at Goliad; Houston was retreating from Gonzales; and the roads 
east of the Guadalupe were thronged with fugitives, seeking a refuge 
in Eastern Texas or across the Sabine. Considering Washington on 
the Brazos too exposed for the seat of government, President Burnet 
established himself at Harrisburg. From there the approach of Santa 
Anna drove him about the middle of April to Galveston Island; but 
there were no accommodations at Galveston, and after the battle 
of San Jacinto the government made its third shift to Velasco. Finally, 
the close of the administration in October found the government at 
Columbia. In the midst of such confusion definite policies were not 
to be expected. The President simply met problems as they arose and 
dealt with them as he could. 

Prior to the battle of San Jacinto, such time as the wanderings 
of the government permitted was employed in efforts to calm the 
fugitives, strengthen the army, and obtain supplies. These efforts 
were not conspicuously successful. The people were panic stricken, 
and paid little attention to Burnet’s reassuring proclamations. Vol¬ 
unteers came but slowly to the army; and the substitution of Thomas 
Toby and Brother in New Orleans for William Bryan as purchasing 
agent of Texas was all but disastrous. Bryan had been appointed by 

345 


346 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the General Council in the fall of 1835, and had used his personal 
credit for nearly eighty thousand dollars in the Texan cause; while 
the Toby brothers were said to be on the verge of bankruptcy at the 
time of their appointment, and proved themselves far less efficient 
than Bryan had been. 

Following the battle of San Jacinto the execution of the Treaty 
of Velasco became an issue. According to the secret treaty, the Texan 
government was to release Santa Anna and send him back to Mexico, 
where he agreed to use his influence to induce his government to 
recognize the independence of Texas. On June 1 Santa Anna was 
placed on board a government vessel destined for Vera Cruz, but 
before it got under way, on June 3, a party of immigrant volunteers 
arrived from New Orleans, and on learning that it was the intention 
to liberate the author of the Alamo and Goliad massacres demanded 
that he be surrendered to them. In the end the civil authorities 
were compelled to recall Santa Anna and turn him over to the 
army. He protested against this breach of the treaty and complained 
of the hardships to which he was exposed; but to this Burnet some¬ 
what sharply replied that Santa Anna’s visit among the Texans had 
caused them some privations and that for that reason they were little 
inclined to regret that he should share them. In July Santa Anna 
appealed to President Jackson to offer intervention in adjusting the 
relations between Texas and Mexico, but the Mexican government 
had disavowed the Treaty of Velasco and had notified the powers 
that it would not recognize as binding upon it any act of Santa 
Anna, so that President Jackson took no action. After the failure 
of an attempt to rescue the distinguished prisoner, he was placed 
in very rigorous confinement, and it was not until the inauguration of 
President Houston in October that he was released. He then visited 
Washington and again proposed intervention to President Jackson but 
Jackson declined to act. In February, 1837, he returned to Mexico, 
being carried to Vera Cruz by a naval vessel of the United States. 
The other Mexican prisoners captured at San Jacinto were liberated 
early in Houston’s administration, after detention first at Galveston 
and later at Liberty. 

The interference of the army in the case of Santa Anna reveals 
another source of confusion during the period of the ad interim gov¬ 
ernment. The refusal of Mexico to accept the verdict of San 
Jacinto and its evident determination to renew the invasion of Texas, 
made it necessary for the Texans to maintain a strong defensive 
force. This was composed chiefly of volunteers from the United 
States, many of whom did not yield patiently to discipline. When 
General Houston went to New Orleans to obtain treatment for his 
ankle, wounded at San Jacinto, the command devolved on General 
Thomas J. Rusk, secretary of war; and when, shortly afterward, Rusk 
resigned and the cabinet appointed Mirabeau B. Lamar to succeed 


A SURVEY OF HOME AFFAIRS 347 

him, the men refused to accept Lamar and elected instead General 
Felix Huston. 

By mid-summer order was sufficiently restored for the people 
to give some attention to the establishment of a regular government. 
On July 23rd, President Burnet issued a proclamation calling an 
election for the first Monday in September. The Congress then 
elected was to meet at Columbia the first Monday in October. Besides 
the election of officers the people were asked to vote on two other 
matters: (I) whether Congress should be given authority to amend 
the constitution; and (2) whether Texas should seek annexation to 
the United States. Three candidates for the presidency appeared, 
Austin, Henry Smith, and General Houston. Houston was elected 
by a large majority, and immediately appointed Austin secretary of 
state and Smith secretary of the treasury. The constitution was 
ratified and the power of amendment was withheld from Congress. 
The vote in favor of annexation stood 3277 to 91. 

President Burnet’s message to the first Congress on October 4 
reviewed the troubled career of the ad interim government and indi¬ 
cated the subjects which in his opinion required the immediate atten¬ 
tion of Congress. Concerning his administration he said: “It will 
be recollected that the powers conferred on the Government, ad interim, 
were extraordinary; that they comprised the plenal attributes of 
sovereignty, the legislative and judicial functions excepted. The cir¬ 
cumstances under which that government has been administered, have 
been equally extraordinary. 

“Sometimes, when Texas was a moving mass of fugitives, they 
have been without a local habitation and scattered to the cardinal 
points; again they have been on Galveston Island, without a shelter, 
and almost without subsistence, and never have they been in cir¬ 
cumstances of comfort and convenience suitable to the orderly con¬ 
ducting of the grave and momentous business committed to their 
charge. That errors should have been committed under such circum¬ 
stances will not surprise those who have had an honest consciousness 
of their own fallibilities. But that those extraordinary powers have 
not been perverted to any sinister purpose, to the damage of the 
country, to personal aggrandisement, or to the creation or advance¬ 
ment of a party, or to the success of a speculation, I assert with a 
modest but firm and assured confidence.” 

First, and most pressing, of the problems with which Congress 
must deal was the organization of a system of finance. The debt 
incurred during the revolution was more than a million and a quarter 
dollars, and the danger of renewed invasion by Mexico entailed a 
continuance of heavy expense in the army. As a Mexican province 
Texas had had no system of taxation, and Congress must attack the 
subject de novo. Burnet recommended a tariff as the most ready 
means of revenue. For the army he recommended a continuance of 


348 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the land bounty law which had expired in July, 1836, and the dis¬ 
couragement of short terms of enlistment. The navy was inadequate 
and an additional large vessel was needed. The judicial system should 
be organized, a postal system established, and some internal improve¬ 
ments begun—such as the bridging of small streams and the establish¬ 
ment of ferries on the larger ones. On October 22nd, President 
Burnet resigned his office and General Houston was inaugurated. 

The most important laws passed by this Congress were those 
dealing with the subjects suggested in Burnet’s message. To meet 
financial needs a loan was authorized for five million dollars, to be 
secured by the public lands and a pledge of the public faith. This 
was passed November 18, 1836. On December 20, 1836, a tariff act 
was passed; on July 7, 1837, an issue of ten per cent interest bearing 
refunding stock was authorized, which was to be exchanged for 
certificates of government indebtedness, and on June 17, 1837, a direct 
property tax of one-half of one per cent ad valorem was authorized. 
At the same time a system of occupation taxes was inaugurated. The 
post office department and the judiciary were established; and on 
December 19, 1836, an important act was passed fixing the boundary 
of Texas at the Rio Grande from its mouth to its source, and thence 
northward to the forty-second parallel of latitude. A law establishing 
a general land office was vetoed by President Houston, but was passed 
by a constitutional majority, and ultimately became effective. 

Houston’s inaugural message was purely formal. His message of 
May 5, 1836, to the second session of the first Congress was of greater 
interest. The United States had recognized the independence of 
Texas on March 3, 1837, and in referring to this the President said: 
“We now occupy the proud attitude of a sovereign and independent 
Republic; which will impose upon us the obligation of evincing to the 
world, that we are worthy to be free. This will only be accomplished 
by wise legislation, the maintenance of our integrity, and the faithful 
and just redemption of our plighted faith wherever it has been pledged. 
Nothing can be better calculated to advance our interests and character, 
than the establishment of a liberal and disinterested policy, enlightened 
by patriotism, and guided by wisdom.” 

Concerning the finances there was nothing encouraging to report. 
Agents appointed to sell land scrip in the United States had failed to 
report; and commissioners appointed to negotiate the five million dollar 
loan had found financial conditions so unsteady in the United States 
that they had been unable to place any portion of the loan. Congress 
should devise a land system that would guard the interest of the gov¬ 
ernment and prevent fraud, and at the same time protect the rights 
of bona fide claimants against conflicting titles. As to the form of this 
law the president made no suggestions. 

The army was in an excellent state of discipline. It had been 
reduced to about a thousnad men, and the annual expense now entailed 


A SURVEY OF HOME AFFAIRS 


349 


by it would fall below two hundred and thirty thousand dollars. The 
navy was too small, and the commerce of the country had suffered 
some damage from Mexican vessels in the Gulf. Steps were being 
taken, however, to mend this deficiency. 

In connection with the navy President Houston referred to the 
subject of the African slave trade: “It cannot be disbelieved,” he said, 
“that thousands of Africans have lately been imported to the Island 
of Cuba, with a design to transfer a large portion of them into this 
republic. This unholy and cruel traffic has called down the reprobation 
of the humane and just of all civilized nations. Our abhorrence to it 
is clearly expressed in our constitution and laws. Nor has it rested 
alone upon the declaration of our policy, but has long since been a 
subject of representation to the government of the United States, our 
ministers apprising it of every fact which would enable it to devise 
such means as would prevent either the landing or introduction of 
Africans into our country. 

“The naval force of Texas not being in a situation to be diverted 
from our immediate defence, will be a sufficient reason why the gov¬ 
ernments of the United States and England should employ such a 
portion of their force in the Gulf as will at once arrest the accursed 
trade and redeem this republic from the suspicion of connivance which 
would be as detrimental to its character as the practice is repugnant 
to the feelings of its citizens. Should the traffic continue the 
odium cannot rest upon us, but will remain a blot upon the escutcheon 
of nations who have power, and withhold their hand from the work 
of humanity.” 

Toward the Indians the President declared it to be the policy of 
the government “to pursue a just and liberal course . . . and to pre¬ 
vent all encroachments upon their rights.” In his second annual 
message of November 21, 1837, he went into this subject more fully. 
It had been the policy of the administration, he said, to seek every 
possible means to establish relations with the Indians upon a basis of 
lasting peace and friendship. “At this time I deem the indications 
more favorable than they have been since Texas assumed her present 
attitude. . . . The undeviating opinion of the Executive has been, 
that from the establishment of trading houses on the frontier (under 
prudent regulations), and the appointment of capable and honest 
agents, the happiest results might be anticipated for the country. The 
intercourse between the citizens and Indians should be regulated by 
acts of Congress which experience will readily suggest.” In neither 
of these messages did the President make important specific recom¬ 
mendations, and few measures of a general character were passed 
during the remainder of his term. 

The constitution provided that the first President should serve two 
years and should be ineligible for immediate reelection. Houston’s 
term expired, therefore, in December, 1838. To succeed him the Vice- 


350 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


president, Mirabeau B. Lamar, was almost unanimously elected. De¬ 
spite a policy of peace with Mexicans and Indians and careful economy 
in all departments of the government, the public debt had increased 
to nearly two million dollars during Houston’s term. No progress 
had been made toward placing the five million dollar loan, and the 
government had begun the issue of paper money. The subject of the 
finances Houston recognized as the most serious problem confronting 
the government, but he indulged strong hope that the organization of 
the land office and the opening of the public lands would speedily yield 
“a boundless revenue.” 

President Lamar’s inaugural address was modeled to some extent 
on that of Thomas Jefferson when he assumed the presidency of the 
United States in 1801. It would be his policy to foster “agriculture, 
commerce, and the useful arts as the true basis of national strength 
and glory”; and at the same time to lay the foundation of those 
higher institutions for moral and mental culture, without which no 
government, on democratic principles, can prosper, nor the people long 
preserve their liberties.” In foreign policy we should “deal justly 
with all nations, aggressively to none”; and we should “court free 
and unrestricted commerce wherever it may be the interest of our 
people to carry the national flag.” He was less wedded to the ways 
of peace, however, than Jefferson had been; and while declaring that 
he preferred peace, he was “not averse from war.” “I shall be ever 
ready to adjust all differences with our enemies by friendly discussion 
and arrangement, and at the same time equally prompt to adopt either 
offensive or defensive operations as their disposition and our own 
safety may render necessary.” He was opposed to the annexation of 
Texas to the United States, and the address pictured eloquently and 
at length the advantages of independence. 

The annual message of December 20, 1838, fills nearly thirty closely 
printed pages. It began with a brief discussion of foreign relations: 
the United States had recognized the independence of Texas and the 
relations between the two countries was most cordial. To England 
and France, too, the independence of Texas could not be a matter of 
indifference, and recognition from them was soon to be expected. 
“With Mexico,” Lamar said, “our posture is unchanged; she seems 
still to cherish the illusive hope of conquest, without adopting any 
means for its realization. A final abandonment of such hopes, or a 
more vigorous prosecution of the measures which would at once de¬ 
termine their worth, would be more consistent with true glory and 
wisdom than this attitude of supine and sullen hostility. While we 
would meet with alacrity the first indication of a desire for a just and 
honorable peace, we should compel a more active prosecution of the 
war. If peace can only be obtained by the sword, let the sword do 
its work.” This suggests a more aggressive policy than President 
Houston had favored. 


A SURVEY OF HOME AFFAIRS 


351 


Toward the Indians, too, Lamar was less patient than Houston 
had been, which may be partly explained, perhaps, by the fact that 
he entered political life as the private secretary of Governor George M. 
Troup of Georgia. “As long as we continue to exhibit our mercy 
without showing our strength,” he said, “so long will the Indians con¬ 
tinue to bloody the tomahawk and move onward in the work of rapac¬ 
ity and slaughter.” The Indians who emigrated from the United States 
—such as the Cherokees and their allies—had never acquired from 
Mexico any title to the lands that they occupied, and the treaty which, 
by the authority of the Consultation and the provisional government, 
was negotiated with these Indians in February, 1836, had never been 
ratified by any competent Texan authority. This fact absolved Texas 
of any legal responsibility in the matter and the conduct of the Indians 
had left it under no moral obligation toward them. “I would respect¬ 
fully offer the following suggestions: That there be established, as 
early as practicable, a line of military posts, competent to the pro¬ 
tection of our frontier from the incursions of the wandering tribes 
that infest our borders; and that all intercourse between them and our 
citizens be made under the eye, and subject to the control of the gov¬ 
ernment. In order to allay the apprehensions of the friendly tribes, 
and prevent any collision between them and our citizens, I would 
recommend that each Indian family be permitted to enjoy such im¬ 
provements as they occupy, together with a suitable portion of land, 
without interruption or annoyance, so long as they choose to remain 
upon it, and shall deport themselves in a friendly manner, being sub¬ 
ordinate to our laws in all criminal matters, and in matters of con¬ 
tract, to the authorized agents of the government.” 

To this end, the appointment of suitable agents, to reside among 
the located tribes would be necessary; whose duty it should be to 
keep up a vigilant espionage, cultivate friendly relations, and, as far 
as practicable, prevent all causes of disturbance and collision between 
the Indians and our own people. Commissioners might be appointed 
to make treaties to this effect with such tribes as were disposed to peace 
and friendship, while those who rejected the terms should be viewed as 
enemies, and treated accordingly. 

“These gratuitous and liberal concessions, on our part, are perhaps 
due to the regard which we all entertain for peace. If, unhappily, 
they should be found inadequate to secure that desirable object, and 
the Indians shall persist in their extravagant demands, and resolve 
upon war, then let them feel that there are terrors also in the enmity 
of the white man, and that the blood of our wives and children cannot 
be shed without a righteous retribution.” For this reason the Presi¬ 
dent was moved to recommend the strengthening of the army and navy, 
while at the same time organizing the militia. 

There had not been time since his inauguration, Lamar said, for 
the President to inquire into fiscal affairs. The success of the loan, 


352 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


however, he considered very problematical; and for that reason he 
was unable to recommend a reduction of taxes or of the tariff. He 
thought that the development of agriculture, commerce, and the min¬ 
eral resources of the country would soon put the government in easy 
condition, and recommended the passage of a law reserving mineral 
rights to the state. 

In the meantime, Lamar recommended the establishment of a 
national bank, owned and controlled by the Republic. Such a bank, 
based on a hypothecation of the national lands, the plighted faith of 
the government, and an adequate specie deposit, would be safe, he 
believed, and would inspire confidence. The specie deposit would not 
need to be so large as in a privately owned bank, but unfortunately, 
as Gouge remarked in his Fiscal History of Texas, Lamar did not 
indicate where any specie was to come from. Few banks in the 
United States were making specie payments at the time, and coin 
was very rare in Texas. 

This message has become justly famous for its strong advocacy 
of public education: “If we desire to etablish a Republican Govern¬ 
ment upon a broad and permanent basis,” said Lamar, “it will become 
our duty to adopt a comprehensive and well regulated system of 
mental and moral culture. Education is a subject in which every 
citizen and especially every parent feels a deep and lively concern. 
It is one in which no jarring interests are involved, and no acrimonious 
political feelings excited; for its benefits are so universal that all 
parties can cordially unite in advancing it. It is admitted by all, that 
cultivated mind is the guardian genius of democracy, and while guided 
and controlled by virtue is the noblest attribute of man. It is the only 
dictator that freemen desire. . . . Let me, therefore, urge it upon 
you, gentlemen, not to postpone the matter too long. The present is 
a propitious moment to lay the foundation of a great moral and intel¬ 
lectual edifice, which will in after ages be hailed as the chief ornament 
and blessing of Texas. A suitable appropriation of lands to the pur¬ 
pose of general education, can be made at this time without incon¬ 
venience to the Government or the people; but defer it until the public 
domain shall have passed from our hands, and the uneducated youths 
of Texas will constitute the living monuments of our neglect and 
remissness. To commence a liberal system of education a few years 
hence may be attended with many difficulties. The imposition of taxes 
will be necessary. Sectional jealousies will spring up; and the whole 
plan may be defeated in the conflict of selfishness; or be suffered to 
languish under a feeble and inefficient support; a liberal endowment 
which will be adequate to the diffusion of a good rudimental education 
in every district of the Republic, and to the establishment of a uni¬ 
versity where the highest branches of science may be taught, can now 
be effected without the expenditure of a single dollar. Postpone it 
a few years, and millions will be necessary to accomplish the great 
design.” 


A SURVEY OF HOME AFFAIRS 


353 


President Lamar’s Indian policy was well received by Congress. 
On the day he delivered the message it passed a bill authorizing the 
organization of a regiment of 840 men for the protection of the fron¬ 
tiers, and appropriated $300,000 in promissory notes to pay the troops. 
On December 29th Congress empowered the President to accept the 
service of eight companies of mounted volunteers, for use chiefly 
against the Comanches, and appropriated $75,000 to that end. On 
January 23, 1839, Congress approved three additional companies; and 
on January 24th appropriated a million dollars for protection of the 
northern and western frontiers. 

During 1839 evidence fell into the hands of the government that 
the Mexicans were endeavoring to incite the Indians to war—particu¬ 
larly the Cherokee Indians. The growth of population and the rapid 
extension of the frontier into the Indian settlements caused constant 
broils and kept the Indians in an ugly mood. In 1839 Cherokees, 
after fierce resistance, were driven from their settlement in East 
Texas, and the next year the Comanches were greatly weakened in three 
notable engagements. The first of these was the Council House Fight 
at San Antonio in March, in which the Indians lost a number of their 
chiefs. In August, General Felix Huston defeated a large force at 
Plum Creek, near Gonzales; and in October, Colonel John H. Moore 
led an expedition that destroyed the chief Comanche village on the 
upper Colorado and killed more than a hundred warriors. By the close 
of Lamar’s term the Indians were undoubtedly in a more submissive 
mood than they had previously been in since the declaration of inde¬ 
pendence, and it seems likely that his aggressive methods must be 
credited with some share of the success that followed Houston’s gen¬ 
tler policy between 1842 and 1845. Houston found them at the begin¬ 
ning of his second term willing for a time to embrace the comforts 
of peace. 

Lamar’s educational views, too, met the approval of Congress, and 
modest provision was made for the endowment of schools and colleges. 
January 26, 1839, a ^ aw provided that three leagues of land should 
be surveyed in each county and devoted to the establishment of primary 
schools or academies. If there was not enough good vacant land in 
a county for this purpose, the survey was to be made from public land 
elsewhere. The President was to have surveyed, also, fifty leagues of 
land “for the establishment and endowment of two colleges or uni¬ 
versities hereafter to be created.” The following year, February 5, 
1840—an additional league was appropriated for the schools of each 
county, and at the same time provision was made for certificating 
teachers. No teacher was to be given a certificate who was not capable 
of teaching reading, writing, English grammar, arithmetic, and 
geography. 

Other important legislation of Lamar’s administration was the first 
“homestead, la w.” approved January 26, 1839; a law granting 640 
acre headrights to immigrant families who arrived in Texas before 



354 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


1840; a law for the permanent location of the capital; and various 
acts for the increase of the revenues. 

The homestead law “reserved to every citizen or head of a family 
in this Republic, free and independent of the power of a writ of 
fieri facias or other execution issuing from any court of competent 
jurisdiction whatever, fifty acres of land or one town lot, including 
his or her homestead and improvements not exceeding five hundred 
dollars in value, all household and kitchen furniture (provided it does 
not exceed in value two hundred dollars), all implements of husbandry 
(provided they shall not exceed fifty dollars in value), all tools, appa¬ 
ratus, and books belonging to the trade or profession of any citizen, 
five milch cows, one yoke of work oxen, or one horse, twenty hogs, 
and one year’s provisions.” “This,” says the late Judge C. W. Raines, 
“appears to be the first homestead act ever passed in any country. 
The spirit of the age was in revolt against the harshness of the com¬ 
mon law as to insolvent debtors; and its first effect was the abolition 
of imprisonment for debt. And the early repeal of the vindictive 
legislation authorizing such imprisonment is the proud boast of many 
States in the American Union. The Republic of Texas makes the 
prouder boast, that her first constitution expressly rejected this relic 
of barbarism.” 

On January 14, 1839, Lamar signed an act creating a commission 
of five to select a site for the permanent location of the government. 
As chosen by Congress, the commissioners were A. C. Horton of 
Matagorda, J. W. Burton of Nacogdoches, William Menifee of 
Colorado, Isaac Campbell of San Augustine, and Louis P. Cooke of 
Brazoria. The only restriction upon their freedom was that the site 
must be between the Brazos and Colorado Rivers and west of the 
San Antonio Road—in other words, it must be on the extreme west¬ 
ern edge of settlement. The act provided that the capital should be 
named Austin. On April 13th the commissioners reported that they 
had selected the village of Waterloo on the east bank of the Colorado 
as the most available location. The President had already appointed 
Edwin Waller to supervise the survey of town lots and the erection 
of public buildings; and so well did he discharge these duties that 
the government was transferred to the new capital in October of 
1839. At the time there was a good deal of opposition on the part of 
jealous towns and localities to the establishment of the capital in the 
western wilderness, but it proved an excellent choice, and undoubtedly 
hastened the extension of the western and northwestern frontier and 
furthered the development of the country. 

Lamar’s was an extremely busy administration. The country was 
actually developing very rapidly. The Indian wars and a more active 
policy toward Mexico than Houston had found it necessary to pursue 
were costly. The country had been compelled to resort to the issue 
of paper money before Lamar came in, and this was already beginning 


A SURVEY OF HOME AFFAIRS 


355 


to depreciate. The five-million-dollar loan authorized by the first 
Congress could be negotiated neither in the United States nor in 
Europe. Tax laws and tariff laws occupied much of the attention 
of every Congress, but since taxes and tariff duties were payable in 
the paper of the government they yielded nothing in real money. As 
paper issues increased depreciation continued, and at the close of 
Lamar’s term in December, 1841, the debt had grown to more than 
seven million dollars, and the value of government paper had declined 
to from fifteen to twenty cents on the dollar. 

Lamar has generally been condemned for his extravagance, and 
certainly some of his policies—notably the Santa Fe expedition, to be 
described in the next chapter—were lacking in judgment; but it is 
difficult to avoid the conclusion that much of his so-called extrava¬ 
gance was justified in the end by its results. In considering the five- 
million-dollar addition to the public debt during the three years of his 
term it must be remembered that the value received by the govern¬ 
ment from its depreciated paper receipts was hardly more than a third 
of that amount. 

For some months during 1840 and 1841 President Lamar was on 
a leave of absence for medical treatment in the United States, and 
the duties of the office were discharged by the Vice-President, David 
G. Burnet. 

Burnet and Houston were candidates for the presidency in 1841, 
and Houston was elected. His message of December 30, 1841, an¬ 
nounced that his policy would be a continuation of that developed 
during his first term, and almost the opposite of that followed by 
Lamar. One-fourth of the money consumed by the wars would 
have been sufficient, he thought, to make our borders safe, if it had 
been employed in cultivating friendly relations with the Indians. He 
advised the conclusion of treaties with as many of the tribes as 
possible, and the establishment of a line of trading posts from the 
frontier to Red River, with one or more traders at each and with 
twenty-five or thirty men to protect them. “I do not doubt,” he 
said, “that this system, once established, would conciliate the In¬ 
dians, open a lucrative commerce with them, and bring continued 
peace to our entire frontier. Their intercourse with us would enable 
them to obtain articles of convenience and comfort which they could 
not otherwise procure, unless by a very indirect trade with more re¬ 
mote tribes who have commerce with traders of the United States. 
Finding a disposition on our own part to treat them fairly and justly, 
and dreading a loss of the advantages and facilities of trade, they 
would be powerfully affected, both by feelings of confidence and 
motives of interest, to preserve peace and maintain good faith.” 

Mexico had rejected the overtures of Texas for recognition, and 
Houston was of the opinion that no further advances should be 
made to the Mexican government. But there was not the slightest 


356 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


danger of conquest from that quarter, and he recommended the cul¬ 
tivation of commercial relations with Mexicans on the border. 

On the subject of the finances the message spoke plainly. “There 
is not a dollar in the treasury; the nation is involved from ten to 
fifteen millions. The precise amount of its liabilities has not been 
ascertained. ... We are not only without money, but without credit, 
and, for want of punctuality, without character. At our first com¬ 
mencement we were not without credit, nor had a want of punctuality 
then impaired our character abroad or confidence at home. Patriotism, 
industry, and enterprise are now our only resources, apart from our 
public domain and the precarious revenues of the country. These 
remain our only hope, and must be improved, husbanded, and properly 
employed.” 

To meet the financial situation President Houston advised the 
passage of stay-laws postponing the redemption of outstanding debts 
“to a period sufficiently remote to enable the government to redeem, 
in good faith, such as it ought to redeem.” To attempt to tax the 
present population for the liquidation of the debt would be ruinous. 
For the future maintenance of the government he recommended the 
issue of $350,000 in exchequer bills, secured by a specific appropria¬ 
tion of a million acres of land in the Cherokee district; and a loan 
of $300,000 secured by specific assignments of the public land, which 
the bondholders were to acquire upon the failure of the government 
to meet the stipulations of its contract. The direct property tax should 
be reduced one-half, the remainder and all other public dues to be 
receivable only in gold and silver, “or equivalent currency.” The 
exchequer bills were to be accepted as “equivalent currency.” 

The situation was all but desperate, and Congress was in the mood 
for economy. It abolished a number of offices and reduced the sal¬ 
aries of others, but did not follow exactly the President’s recom¬ 
mendations. Instead of reducing taxes one-half, Houston complained 
that it almost abolished them; and postponed payment for six months 
of those that it continued; it refused to authorize the new loan and 
repealed the five-million dollar act passed by the first Congress; and 
though it authorized the issue of exchequer bills, it failed to secure 
them by specific allotments of public land, and they rapidly depreci¬ 
ated, as other paper had done. The subject remained a troublesome 
one throughout the remainder of the life of the Republic, and at the 
close of 1845 the public debt was estimated at nearly twelve million 
dollars. 

Houston complained of the inefficiency and expense of the post 
office department. Both of these he attributed in some degree to the 
location of the capital on the edge of the western wilderness. In the 
spring of 1842, therefore, when the Mexicans made a foray and held 
San Antonio for a few days, he decided that the seat of government 
was too exposed, and, acting in accordance with his constitutional 


A SURVEY OF HOME AFFAIRS 


357 


right, transferred it to Houston. An attempt to move the archives, 
however, was violently and successfully resisted by the citizens of 
Austin. Congress met at Houston in the summer of 1842, but there¬ 
after the government was removed to Washington on the Brazos, 
where it remained during the rest of Houston’s term. This defense 
of the archives by the people of Austin has been dubbed the “Archive 
War.” 

In December, 1844, Houston was succeeded by Anson Jones, who 
had been serving as secretary of state. Annexation was the all- 
absorbing issue at the time, and during the following year the domestic 
affairs of the Republic were of small importance. 

During Houston’s second term the active career of the Texas 
navy came to an end. During the revolution four vessels were pur¬ 
chased and put in commission—the Invincible, the Brutus , the Lib¬ 
erty , and the Independence. They rendered a valuable service in 
protecting the coast and in annoying the enemy on his own shores, 
but various casualties overtook them and by the fall of 1837 all were 
gone. The Invincible ran aground at Galveston in trying to escape 
the Mexicans and was destroyed, the Independence was captured, the 
Liberty was sold for debt at New Orleans, and the Brutus was de¬ 
stroyed in Galveston harbor by a storm. 

President Houston’s message of May 5, 1837, reminded Congress 
that the commerce of Texas had suffered for want of an adequate 
navy. One of the first acts of the second Congress, which met at 
Houston in November, 1837, was for the purchase of “a five hundred 
ton ship mounting eighteen guns, two three hundred ton brigs of 
twelve guns each, and three schooners of one hundred and thirty 
tons, mounting five or seven guns each.” For this purpose $280,000 
was appropriated. The President appointed Samuel M. Williams 
of the firm of McKinney and Williams at Quintana to place the con¬ 
tract. In November, 1838, Williams closed a contract with Frederick 
Dawson of Baltimore for six vessels conforming to the above descrip¬ 
tion, and during the summer and fall of 1839 they were delivered. 
As rechristened by the Texans, they were the Austin, the Wharton, the 
Archer, the San Bernard, the San lacinto, and the San Antonio. In 
addition to these, General James Hamilton had purchased for the 
government the Zavala. 

As the French fleet had in the meantime destroyed the Mexican 
navy, the Texans vessels were for the moment not needed for de¬ 
fense, and Congress passed an act in February, 1840, requiring the 
President to retire from the service temporarily all except those needed 
as revenue cutters. The act provided, however, that “should Mexico 
make any hostile demonstration upon the Gulf, the President may 
order any number of vessels into active service that he may deem 
necessary for the public security.” 

Lamar received information that Mexico was trying to obtain 


358 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


vessels in England for an attack on Texas, and therefore exercised 
the discretion which the law allowed him to keep the Texan fleet 
in service. Five of the vessels, commanded by Commodore E. W. 
Moore, he sent on a cruise to Yucatan, which was in rebellion against 
Mexico, and the following year (1841) a temporary alliance was 
made with Yucatan by which that state agreed to pay Texas $8,000 
for putting to sea three of its vessels and $8,000 for every month of 
their active service against the common enemy. 

By the spring of 1842 the fleet was back in New Orleans under¬ 
going repairs preparatory to enforcing Houston’s blockade of Mexi¬ 
can ports. Before the vessels were ready for sea, however, the block¬ 
ade was withdrawn. 

In January, 1843, Congress passed a secret act ordering the sale 
of the navy, but the commissioners sent by the President to New 
Orleans to carry out the sale were persuaded by Commodore Moore 
to sail with him to Yucatan, the government of which had agreed to 
pay liberally for the assistance. His chief motive seems to have 
been to obtain money with which to pay debts in New Orleans in¬ 
curred in fitting out the vessels, and for which he felt a personal 
responsibility. A violent quarrel arose between Moore and the Pres¬ 
ident, who finally issued a proclamation, declaring that Moore was 
guilty of “disobedience, contumacy, and mutiny.” The quarrel had 
the effect of making public the law for the sale of the navy, and this 
aroused such strong popular opposition that the act was repealed 
February 5, 1844. When Texas was annexed to the United States 
its remaining vessels, four in number, were incorporated in the United 
States navy. 

In contrast with the government, the people of Texas were coming 
to be fairly prosperous during the closing years of the republic. Im¬ 
migration had been rapid since the battle of San Jacinto, and by 
1846, there were probably a hundred thousand white inhabitants. Most 
of them came from the United States, where the panic of 1837 and 
subsequent years of depression turned the attention of many to the 
free lands of Texas as a field in which to rebuild their broken for¬ 
tunes. Next in number to the Americans were the German immi¬ 
grants, with here and there an occasional Englishman or Frenchman. 
A revival of the empresario system had been instrumental in hasten¬ 
ing the settlement of the western and northwestern frontier. Crops 
were good and commerce was increasing, and indications were not 
lacking that in 1845 the hardest days of the Republic were over. 


CHAPTER XXVIII 


A SURVEY OF THE FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE 
REPUBLIC 

By Eugene C. Barker 

[This selection is a survey of the international relations of the Republic of 
Texas. It is from the same source as the preceding chapter, and like that 
chapter can be supplemented by an abundance of material. Read: Garrison, 
Texas, Chapter XX; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School Hisiory of Texas, 
169-187; George Lockhart Rives, The United States and Mexico, 1821-1848, I, 
Chapter XIX; J. L. Worley, “The Diplomatic Relations of England and the 
Republic of Texas,” in the Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, 
IX, 1-40; Ethel Zivley Rather, “Recognition of the Republic of Texas by the 
United States,” in the same Quarterly, XIII, 155-256; H. R. Edwards, “Diplo¬ 
matic Relations between France and the Republic of Texas,” in The South¬ 
western Historical Quarterly, XX, 209-241, 341-356. Two important collections 
of source material on the international relations of the Republic of Texas are: 
G. P. Garrison (ed.), Diplomatic Correspondence of the Republic of Texas 
(three volumes) in Report of the American Historical Association, 1907, Vol¬ 
ume II, and 1908, Volume II; E. D. Adams (ed.) “British Correspondence 
Concerning Texas,” in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, running serially 
through volumes XV-XXI. Garrison's Diplomatic Correspondence was pub¬ 
lished by the Government Printing Office and can be bought cheaply from the 
Superintendent of Documents, Washington, D. C.] 

As a subject of international politics the Republic of Texas occu¬ 
pied no small place in the diplomacy of three of the principal powers 
of the world—the United States, England, and France, not to men¬ 
tion Mexico. This was largely due to the refusal of Mexico to 
recognize Texan independence. On May 20, 1836, as has already 
been said, the Mexican Congress passed a resolution declaring that 
Santa Anna had no power to bind the nation in the Treaty of Velasco, 
and notifying the world that Mexico would recognize no action taken 
by him while a prisoner. At the same time it was announced that 
the government was determined to reduce the rebellious Texans and 
was preparing an expedition for that purpose. 

In fact, the government exerted itself strenuously to prevent the 
evacuation of Texas by General Filisola, who succeeded to the com¬ 
mand of the Mexican army after the capture of Santa Anna. He 
was instructed at all costs to retain San Antonio, and was told that 
a division of 4,000 men was being prepared to reinforce him. Fili¬ 
sola was already on the retreat to Matamoros when this dispatch 

359 


360 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


reached him, and he continued his retreat. The next communication 
from the government relieved him of the command and appointed 
General Urrea to the place, but Urrea was now in Matamoros, whither 
he had preceded Filisola, and Filisola surrendered the command to 
General Andrade. Despite orders from Urrea to halt, Andrade con¬ 
tinued the march to Matamoros, and before the end of July every 
Mexican soldier had crossed the Rio Grande. 

Mexico continued to threaten invasion, and the Texans expected 
an expedition during the fall of 1836. On June 25, 1836, Colonel 
Powhatan Ellis, charge d'affaires of the United States in Mexico, 
wrote his government that Mexico seemed determined to push the 
war, and that men were being impressed daily in the streets of the 
capital to swell the army of invasion. 

More important, from the point of view of the United States, was 
the rumor which Ellis had heard on good authority that Mexico had 
appealed to England for assistance in reducing Texas. On August 
3 Ellis wrote more definitely on this subject. He said that the Mex¬ 
ican minister at London had been instructed to appeal to England for 
aid in restricting the spread of slavery; and then, if these overtures 
were cordially received, to ask help directly in putting down the re¬ 
volted colonists in Texas who were disobeying the Mexican laws 
and introducing slaves. 

On October 26 Ellis wrote that the troops that had been collect¬ 
ing in the capital had taken up the march for Texas the week before 
under the command of General Nicolas Bravo. They were all raw 
levies, he said, and probably did not exceed 4,000. Bravo seemed 
confident of success, and declared that the force would be increased 
to 12,800 men before it reached Texas. But, said Ellis, “However 
confident the officers may be of their success in the ensueing campaign, 
there is no doubt that a panic already prevails among the soldiers.” 

Long before these troops reached Texas party conflicts between 
the Centralists and the Federalists made it necessary for the Mexican 
government to turn them aside for service nearer home, and the 
danger to Texas passed. Though Mexican vessels were able for a 
time, on account of the weakness of the Texan navy, to annoy the 
Gulf trade, President Houston was wise enough to perceive that Mex¬ 
ico was practically helpless, and to adopt the policy of ignoring it as 
a source of real danger. 

In the fall of 1838 the attention of Mexico was still further 
diverted from Texas by trouble with France. On November 27 a 
French squadron blockaded Vera Cruz, and a state of war practically 
existed until the following spring. Notwithstanding President 
Lamar's defiant inaugural address, he was anxious enough for peace 
with Mexico, and seeing in the French embroglio a favorable occa¬ 
sion for overtures, he appointed Barnard E. Bee to open negotiations. 

Bee was courteously received at Vera Cruz by General Victoria, 


A SURVEY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS 


361 


who had been instructed by the Mexican government to treat him as 
a private individual and to get from him in writing a statement of 
his objects. If he came as a commissioner from Mexico’s rebellious 
colonists, the government might consider his proposals; but if he came 
to treat for recognition, the government would ignore him, and Vic¬ 
toria should request him to depart. Bee accomplished nothing, and 
sailed from Vera Cruz on June i in a French vessel bound for 
Havana. He was encouraged by his experience, however, and 
thought the day not distant “when a definite treaty boundary will be 
established between Mexico and Texas, consecrated as it must be 
by a lasting peace.” As for an invasion of Texas, Bee thought it 
was preposterous: “They have no navy; they have not a dollar in 
the treasury; they have not paid their officers or men for years; they 
owe Great Britain sixty millions of dollars; they are paying France 
200,000 dollars every two months. Where then are they to get money 
to annihilate Texas? Sir, the question is settled.” 

Following Bee’s withdrawal from Vera Cruz, the Texan govern¬ 
ment became convinced that the government really desired peace. 

This conviction was induced by representations which James Treat 
of New York made to General James Hamilton, who was represent¬ 
ing Texas as a commissioner in placing the five million dollar loan. 
Treat said that he had received information through a friend in 
Mexico, an Italian gentleman, named Vitalba. This friend later came 
to New Orleans and had a conference with Treat and Bee, who had 
now reached that place on his return from Vera Cruz. From New 
Orleans Treat went to Texas and was commissioned to proceed to 
Mexico and negotiate for peace on the basis of recognition. Recog¬ 
nition being granted, the only question remaining would be that of 
boundary. Texas would insist on the statutory boundary of Decem¬ 
ber 19, 1836, following the Rio Grande from its mouth to its source 
and extending thence northward to the forty-second parallel. For 
this line Texas was willing to pay Mexico five million dollars, which 
Treat could disburse as seemed desirable, using as much as might be 
necessary in “secret service” work. At the same time Mexico might 
be sounded on a boundary which would follow the Rio Grande up 
to El Paso, and thence proceed due westward to the Gulf of Cali¬ 
fornia and the Pacific Ocean. After the settlement of these two 
questions the agent might take up the negotiation of a treaty of amity 
and commerce. 

Treat first returned to New York, and thence made his way to 
Mexico. He arrived at Vera Cruz November 28, 1839, and reached 
the capital two weeks later. Through the British charge, Sir Richard 
Pakenham, he established unofficial communication with the govern¬ 
ment and placed his proposal before it. For a time he believed that 
the prospect of success was good; but after a year of alternating 
hope and discouragement he abandoned his vain task and embarked 


362 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

for Galveston. He died on November 30, 1840, before reaching his 
destination. 

Two weeks before Treat’s death the British government signed a 
convention with the Texan minister at London agreeing to offer 
mediation in Mexico for the recognition of Texas. Hoping that this 
might induce a more conciliatory mood in the Mexican government, 
Lamar commissioned James Webb to proceed to Vera Cruz with full 
powers to negotiate a treaty. At Vera Cruz, however, Webb was not 
allowed to land, and communication with Pakenham at Mexico re¬ 
vealed the fact that the government had rejected the British offer of 
mediation. 

In the meantime, the Federalists in northern Mexico had been mak¬ 
ing overtures to Texas. First they desired to transport arms through 
the republic, and later they proposed an alliance. They planned to 
detach the northern states from Mexico, and went so far as to declare 
the independence of the Republic of the Rio Grande in January, 1840. 
The Texan government declined to have anything to do with this 
movement, but a considerable force of Texan volunteers joined the 
Federalists and participated in several rather serious battles. 

Lamar’s administration saw the only attempt that the Texans ever 
made to realize the boundary fixed by the law of December 19, 1836. 
The chief city in New Mexico was Santa Fe, on the east side of 
the Rio Grande, and therefore within the limits claimed by Texas. 
Between Santa Fe and St. Louis, Missouri, a valuable trade had long 
existed, and the strongest motive influencing Lamar seems to have 
been the desire to turn the profits of this trade to Texas. On April 
14, 1840, he wrote a letter to “the citizens of Santa Fe,” reminding 
them that Texas had “entered the great family of nations” and been 
recognized by the United States and France, while other powers of 
Europe were ready to extend the right hand of fellowship. The 
population was rapidly increasing by immigration from Europe and 
the United States; “and our commerce extending with a power and 
celerity seldom equaled in the history of nations. Under these aus¬ 
picious circumstances, we tender to you a full participation in our 
blessings.” He hoped that this communication would be received 
in the same spirit of kindness and sincerity in which it was dictated 
and expressed the hope that he should be able to send commissioners 
to the people of Santa Fe in September “to explain more minutely 
the condition of our country, of the sea-board, and the correlative in¬ 
terests, which so emphatically recommend, and ought perpetually to 
cement, the perfect union and identity of Santa Fe and Texas.” 

No reply to this communication was received, nor were commis¬ 
sioners sent in 1840. The suggestion aroused some interest in Texas, 
however, and the secretary of war recommended the construction of 
a military road to Santa Fe. Congress refused to make appropriation 
for a commission, but in the spring of 1841 President Lamar deter- 


A SURVEY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS 


363 


mined, nevertheless, that one should be sent, and on his own authority 
ordered the treasurer and comptroller to honor drafts presented for 
outfitting the expedition. 

As finally organized the Santa Fe expedition consisted of three 
commissioners—William G. Cooke, R. F. Brenham, and J. A. Navarro 
—fifty merchants, and a military escort for protection from the In¬ 
dians of two hundred and seventy men commanded by General Hugh 
McLeod. The whole party organized near Austin and set out toward 
the end of June. The commissioners bore an eloquent address from 
Lamar to the “Inhabitants of Santa Fe and other portions of Mexico 
East of the Rio Grande” inviting them to cover themselves with the 
protection of the Texan flag. The commissioners were instructed to 
try to secure the adhesion of the people to Texas, but not to use 
force; and if the Texan proffer were declined, to devote their efforts 
to establishing a commercial convention. The expedition reached New 
Mexico in the last stages of exhaustion from starvation and thirst 
and surrendered to Governor Armijo, who refused to believe that the 
Texans came on an innocent mission. 

The prisoners were marched to Mexico and sent thence to various 
prisons. Those who were citizens of the United States or of European 
countries were soon released through the efforts of their governments; 
and Daniel Webster as secretary of State of the United States inter¬ 
ceded with the Mexican government for the humane treatment of the 
Texans. On June 13, 1842, Santa Anna celebrated his birthday by 
releasing the remaining prisoners, except Navarro, who did not make 
his escape until 1845. 

In the meantime Mexico had again taken the aggressive and had 
made a brief invasion of Texas. On January 9, 1842, General Mari¬ 
ano Arista issued from Monterey an address to the inhabitants of the 
“Department of Texas” pointing out the hopelessness of their struggle 
for independence and promising amnesty and protection to all who 
refrained from taking up arms during his contemplated invasion. At 
the same time he warned them that while his country held out “the 
olive branch of peace and concord” with one hand, she would direct 
with the other “the sword of justice against the obstinate.” Early in 
March Goliad, Refugio, San Antonio, and Victoria were occupied for a 
few days by Mexican forces. The Texans were entirely unprepared, 
and at first great alarm was felt. General Albert Sidney Johnston 
wrote General Hamilton on March 11, “the war, after great prepara¬ 
tion on the part of the enemy, is upon us without the slightest effort 
having been made by us. Our people are however turning out well 
and hastening westward, for the purpose of concentrating to meet 
the enemy, and notwithstanding every advantage has been given, we 
rely upon the energy and courage of our people to achieve most 
brilliant results.” 

On the 10th President Houston issued a proclamation ordering 


364 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the militia to be ready for a call, and the next day he wrote the 
Texan consul at New Orleans telling him the conditions upon which 
the government would receive emigrants from the United States: each 
should bring with him “a good rifle or musket, with a cartouch box, 
or shot pouch and powder horn, with at least one hundred rounds of 
ammunition, a good knapsack and six months’ clothing, and enter 
service for six months subject to the laws of Texas. They must be 
landed for the present at some point west of the Brazos, with eight 
days’ provision. No number less than fifty-six in companies well 
organized will be received, and on landing each commandant will 
report to the secretary of war for orders.” 

By March 15 the Texan forces began to collect at San Antonio, 
but the Mexicans had retired on the 9th, and were already thought 
to be west of the Rio Grande. Many of the volunteers were anxious 
to invade Mexico, and General Burleson, who was in command at 
San Antonio, thought the invasion practicable. President Houston, 
however, wisely forbade such a movement before July 20, which was 
the earliest date at which he thought the necessary preparations could 
be made. 

Fearing that Austin would be attacked, the President had trans¬ 
ferred the government to Houston, and thither he called a special 
session of Congress to meet on July 27. In his message he expressed 
the belief that Mexico could never reconquer Texas, but he was con¬ 
vinced that it would continue to harass the frontier, and he advised 
a counter-invasion to bring the enemy to their senses. “We could at 
least impress them with the calamities which have thus far been 
incident to us alone, and create in them a desire for that peace which 
would be mutually advantageous to both parties.” As usual, however, 
Houston refrained from pushing his views strongly on Congress, 
merely urging that a decision be reached quickly, so that additional 
emigrant-volunteers could be prevented from coming to the country 
if they were not to be needed. Congress voted for a declaration of 
war, and appropriated ten million acres of land to meet the expense, 
but this Houston considered totally inadequate and vetoed the bill, 
thereby abandoning for his own part the plan of an aggressive cam¬ 
paign. 

The Mexicans had retired without doing any considerable damage, 
and it seems that the chief purpose of the invasion was to counteract 
the argument of annexationists in the United States, who contended 
that since Mexico had never made an official entrance into Texas since 
1836, no attention need be paid by the United States to its claims. In 
September, 1842, another expedition penetrated to San Antonio under 
the command of General Adrian Woll. This time some resistance 
was offered and the Mexicans lost a few men, before the Texans, fifty- 
three in number, surrendered. The district court was in session at the 
time, and Judge Hutchinson and other officials were among those 


A SURVEY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS 


365 


captured. As soon as the news spread Texan forces began to march 
to the relief of San Antonio, and a band of volunteers from Gon¬ 
zales under Colonel Matthew Caldwell succeeded in decoying a por¬ 
tion of Woll’s division into an ambush on the Salado and inflicting 
considerable loss upon it. At the same time, however, a company 
from La Grange and Fayette County, coming to the relief of Cald¬ 
well, was surrounded by the Mexicans and cut to pieces. Woll occu¬ 
pied San Antonio September 11-20, and then retired, being pursued 
for several days by Colonel Caldwell. 

Again the militia was called out, and volunteers began to collect 
at San Antonio, eager for an invasion of Mexico. About the middle 
of November some 750 men commanded by General Alexander 
Somervell started for Laredo. They took Laredo on December 8, 
and part of the force then disbanded and returned home. The re¬ 
mainder continued the march down the Rio Grande, but on December 
19 Somervell ordered them to retreat to Gonzales. Some three hun¬ 
dred of the men refused to obey his orders, elected Colonel W. S. 
Fisher to lead them, and marched to Mier, where they fought a des¬ 
perate battle with General Ampudia on December 25-26. The odds 
were hopelessly against them, and on the 26th they surrendered. 

General Thomas Jefferson Green in his Journal of the Texian 
Expedition against Mier says that the Texans were promised the treat¬ 
ment of prisoners of war, though the official capitulation says merely 
that the Texans will be treated “with the consideration which is in 
accordance with the magnanimous Mexican nation/* Green tells us 
that there were 261 Texans engaged in the battle of Mier, nearly 
forty having been left in camp to guard the baggage. Ten were killed, 
and twenty-three badly wounded, while the loss of the Mexicans was 
thought to be more than 700. General Ampudia was ordered to send 
the prisoners to the capital. On the way they made a break for 
liberty, but were later recaptured in the mountains and a tenth of 
their number shot. The survivors were eventually imprisoned in 
Castle Perote. 

While the Mier prisoners were marching toward the south an¬ 
other Texan expedition commanded by Colonel Jacob Snively was 
moving toward the northern boundary of Texas to capture a train 
of merchandise which it was known would be carried during the sum¬ 
mer of 1843 from St. Louis to Santa Fe. The expedition had been 
authorized by the Texan government in February, but the force was 
composed of volunteers who went at their own expense and who ex¬ 
pected to repay themselves by the spoils of the caravan. They en¬ 
camped on the Arkansas River to await the train, but before it arrived 
the party divided and Snively was left with only a few more than 
a hundred men. When the caravan arrived it was guarded by United 
States soldiers, who disarmed all but ten of Snively’s men and ordered 
them home. The Texan government claimed damages from the 


366 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


United States for this act and was paid for the arms taken, but the 
expedition failed. 

In the meantime President Houston had been trying to bring pres¬ 
sure on Mexico through the mediation of the strong foreign powers. 
The United States, as we have seen, recognized the independence of 
Texas in March, 1837, by accrediting to the Republic a charge 
d’affaires. France recognized it by concluding a treaty of commerce 
and friendship on September 25, 1839, and the treaty was ratified on 
February 14, 1840. British recognition was obtained in a series of 
treaties concluded in November, 1840, but these were not ratified 
until June 28, 1842. One of these British treaties was an agreement 
on the part of England to urge upon Mexico the recognition of Texas, 
and Lord Aberdeen on July 1, 1842, instructed the British charge at 
Mexico to make the necessary representation to the Mexican govern¬ 
ment. This was done, but the overture was rejected. Immediately 
following the ratification of the British treaties an effort was made 
to get France, England, and the United States to make a joint demand 
on Mexico for recognition, but England refused to become a party 
to this tripartite action. At the same time, however, Lord Aberdeen 
suggested that the three governments might make identical represen¬ 
tations on the subject to the Mexican government. Appropriate in¬ 
structions were accordingly issued to the diplomatic agents of England 
and France for making such a representation, but these agents, know¬ 
ing the uselessness of such action did nothing. 

On October 15, 1842, just after the retreat of General Woll from 
San Antonio President Houston again appealed to the powers to use 
their influence to compel Mexico either to recognize the independence 
of Texas “or to make war upon her according to the rules established 
and universally recognized by civilized nations. “It has now been 
nearly seven years,” he said, “since the Declaration and the estab¬ 
lishment of the Independence of this Republic. During the whole of 
this time, Mexico, although uniformly asserting the ability and deter¬ 
mination to re-sub jugate the country, has never made a formidable 
effort to do so. Her principal war has consisted of silly taunts and 
idle threats, of braggadocio bulletins and gasconading proclamations. 
All her boasted threats of invasion have resulted in nothing more 
than fitting out and sending into the most exposed portions of our 
territory petty marauding parties, for the purpose of pillaging and 
harassing the weak and isolated settlements on our western border.” 
Mexico’s object, he said, was merely to keep alive its claim to Texas 
and to retard the development of the country by threats that it had 
neither the intention nor the means to carry out. 

Daniel Webster was secretary of state at this time in the United 
States, and on November 12, 1842, he instructed Waddy Thompson, 
the minister of the United States at Mexico, to urge recognition. 
The United States saw with pain the preparations for war, Webster 


A SURVEY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS 


367 


said, and while it disclaimed any right to interfere, it could not be 
indifferent to a renewal of hostilities. He urged Mexico to accept 
the mediation of his government, and at the same time asked Texas 
to suspend any invasion it might be contemplating until the result of 
this overture could be learned. 

Nothing came of this proposal, but on January 9, 1843, James W. 
Robinson, who had been lieutenant-governor of Texas under the pro¬ 
visional government in 1835-1836, and then had been captured at San 
Antonio by General Woll in September, 1842, and was now in Perote, 
made a proposal to Santa Anna which led to negotiations. Robinson, 
who was anxious above all things to get out of prison, suggested that 
the people of Texas were tired of war and confusion and would be 
willing to be reunited with Mexico. He thought that if an armistice 
could be arranged, peace could probably be brought about by discus¬ 
sion. After a conference with him Santa Anna appointed Robinson a 
commissioner to go to Texas and open negotiation. Reunion with 
Mexico must be the sine qua non of any arrangement, but after 
acknowledging the sovereignty of Mexico, Texas might conduct its 
local affairs through its own officers pretty much as it pleased. Mex¬ 
ican troops would never be sent to the province. 

President Houston had no intention of acknowledging the sov¬ 
ereignty of Mexico on any terms, but he was willing to play for time. 
A correspondence was continued through the British diplomatic agents 
at Mexico and at Houston, and it was finally agreed that commis¬ 
sioners should meet and arrange the terms of an armistice for the 
negotiation of a permanent settlement. Houston proclaimed a truce 
on June 15, 1843, and commissioners were appointed in the fall by 
both Texas and Mexico. They met at Salinas on the Rio Grande, 
and February 15, 1844, signed the armistice. Before following this 
phase of the subject further it will be necessary to return and trace 
briefly the movement for the annexation of Texas to the United States. 

When Texas declared independence on March 2, 1836, the Texan 
commissioners, Austin, Archer, and William H. Wharton, were in the 
United States; and Austin was of the opinion that they could have 
obtained from Congress the recognition of the new republic, if the 
ad interim government had sent them an official report of the battle 
of San Jacinto. Austin may have been mistaken, but both houses of 
Congress certainly sympathized deeply with the Texans, and before 
adjournment the Senate committee on foreign relations reported that 
Texas ought to be recognized as soon as it had in operation a de facto 
government “capable of performing the duties and fulfilling the obliga¬ 
tions of an independent power.” 

On May 30 President Burnet appointed James W. Collinsworth 
and P. W. Grayson to visit Washington and ask the mediation of the 
United States in securing from Mexico recognition of Texan in¬ 
dependence. At the same time they were to sound the government on 


368 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the subject of annexing Texas to the United States. They reached 
Washington after the adjournment of Congress and had several con¬ 
ferences with Forsyth, President Jackson’s secreatry of state, but 
received no satisfaction. In the fall of 1836 the Texans, as we have 
seen, voted (3277 to 91) in favor of annexation to the United States, 
and one of President Houston’s first acts was to send William H. 
Wharton to Washington to further this measure. 

It was apparent, however, that recognition of Texan independence 
must precede any negotiation for annexation and at first President 
Jackson showed himself unexpectedly cautious. He had sent Henry 
M. Morfit to Texas in the summer of 1836 to report on the ability 
of the new government to maintain itself. Morfit wrote ten letters 
from Texas filled with information that makes them a most valuable 
source for the history of this time. On the whole his opinion of 
Texas was very favorable, but Bravo’s invasion was expected during 
the winter and he advised that the United States should withhold 
recognition until the result of the invasion was seen. President Jack- 
son accepted the advice, and in a special message of December 21, 
1836, recommended that Congress await the outcome of the contem¬ 
plated Mexican expedition. He closed the message by saying, how¬ 
ever, that if Congress held a different opinion, he would be glad to 
cooperate in extending recognition without further delay. 

For reasons that we have already seen Bravo did not reach Texas 
during the winter, and thus strengthened the friends of Texas in 
Congress. On March 1, 1837, the Senate voted for recognition; and 
the House made appropriation to pay the salary of a diplomatic repre¬ 
sentative to Texas whenever the President thought it desirable to send 
one. Jackson considered this equivalent to recognition, and March 
3, 1837, appointed Alcee La Branche of Louisiana charge d’affaires 
to Texas. 

This step opened the way for the advancement of the annexation 
question, and on August 4 Memucan Hunt, the Texan representative, 
formally offered Texas to the United States. He argued that the 
revolution had been justified by the treatment which Texas had re¬ 
ceived from Mexico and by the hopeless political anarchy that had 
existed in Mexico since 1821; that Texas was now independent and 
free to dispose of itself without hindrance from any power; and that 
annexation would be mutually beneficial to the United States and to 
Texas. President Van Buren was opposed to annexation, however, 
and flatly declined the Texan office. The question of slavery was 
becoming acute in the United States, and annexation was opposed by 
the anti-slavery party chiefly because it would extend slave territory. 
At the same time it was pretty evident that annexation would lead to 
war with Mexico. President Houston withdrew the offer of annexa¬ 
tion in October, 1838, and there the matter rested for nearly five years. 

During those five years the government of Texas became more 


A SURVEY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS 


369 


and more involved in debt, but the country itself developed rapidly 
and its commerce became an object of some consideration. When this 
fact was perceived in the United States the annexation question ceased 
to be a purely sectional issue, and it became possible to consider the 
subject to some extent on its merits. Aside from the awakened eco¬ 
nomic interest, a general uneasiness spread over the country lest 
England should gain ascendancy in Texas. England was known to 
desire a source of cotton supply outside the United States and to be 
interested in universal abolition of slavery. Texas offered a tempt¬ 
ing field for British activity. Recent investigations have disclosed 
little evidence of a desire on the part of England to incorporate Texas 
in the British empire, but they have clearly proved its wish to estab¬ 
lish a controlling influence in Texas and to prevent its annexation by 
the United States. 

On October 16, 1843, President Tyler opened negotiations for the 
annexation of Texas by treaty. He was a slave owner, and was 
doubtless not averse to an extension of the slave territory of the 
United States, but he sincerely believed that Great Britain was on 
the point of gaining a foothold in Texas which would be harmful to 
the United States. He may also have been influenced to some extent 
by the ambition to have his administration identified with a great 
measure like annexation, but it is now in a fair way to be conceded 
by students that his idea was statesman-like and his motive patriotic. 

The truce between Texas and Mexico had just been arranged, and 
President Houston was in a position to feign indifference, if he did 
not feel it. He would not entertain Tyler’s proposal until he was 
assured of two things: (1) that the treaty would command the two- 
thirds majority necessary for its ratification in the Senate; and (2) 
that the United States would use its army and navy to protect Texas 
during the pendency of the negotiations, in case Mexico renewed its 
attempts at invasion. When he was satisfied on these points the treaty 
was signed at Washington, April 12, 1844. The Senate rejected it 
on June 8th. 

The motives of the senators who voted against annexation varied, 
but most of them were moved by the desire to postpone the issue 
until after the presidential election, which would take place the follow¬ 
ing November. Tyler immediately submitted the question to the 
House and proposed annexation by joint resolution, which would 
require merely a simple majority vote, but Congress adjourned the 
middle of June without action. 

As Houston had foreseen would be the case, Mexico broke off the 
armistice as soon as it learned of the negotiations between the United 
States and Texas. As a matter of fact there had never been a chance 
of reaching an adjustment, because Texas had no intention of accept¬ 
ing less than recognition on condition of its assuming a portion of 
the Mexican debt, and Mexico insisted on unconditional reunion. 


370 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


On June 16th General Woll notified President Houston that Mexico 
had resumed hostilities on the nth of that month. Houston thereupon 
called on the United States to fulfill its promise of protection, and on 
September ioth John C. Calhoun, who was now Tyler’s secretary of 
state, notified Mexico that the President would regard the invasion 
of Texas as “highly offensive” to the United States. The Mexican 
minister of foreign relations replied that his country would not be 
intimidated by the President’s threats to desist from the effort to 
regain what was its own, but the Mexican government soon found 
reason to change its policy in the hope that Texas might be induced 
thereby to suspend further annexation negotiations. 

During the summer of 1844 annexation was the most prominent 
question before the people of the United States. All the presidential 
candidates were required to define their positions with regard to it. 
Van Buren, the leading Democratic candidate, declared against imme¬ 
diate annexation, and failed of nomination by the national convention, 
which chose James K. Polk, a “dark horse” from Tennessee who had 
frankly declared for immediate annexation. Henry Clay, the leading 
Whig candidate, was also opposed to immediate annexation, and this 
is believed to have been the chief reason for the victory of Polk and 
the Democrats in the November election. Undoubtedly the tariff and 
other questions played a part in Polk’s election, but the country as 
a rule interpreted his victory as a demand for annexation. 

Tyler did not wait for Polk’s inauguration to carry out this impor¬ 
tant measure. He placed the subject before Congress in December, 
1844, and a joint resolution was finally passed on February 28, 1845, 
defining the terms of annexation. Texas was to be admitted as a 
state and might, when qualified, be divided into as many as five states. 
Slavery was excluded from that portion of the territory claimed by 
Texas north of the parallel of 36° 30' north latitude; and boundary 
disputes with Mexico were to be adjusted by the United States. Texas 
was to retain its public lands as a means of paying the debt of the 
Republic. 

England and France, as well as Mexico, were greatly opposed to 
the annexation of Texas by the United States, and on January 12, 
1844, before the treaty was negotiated, Lord Aberdeen instructed 
the British Minister at Paris to sound the French government and 
learn whether it would cooperate with England in “deprecating all 
interference on the part of the United States in the affairs of Texas, 
or the adoption of any measure leading to the destruction of the sepa¬ 
rate existence of that State; at the same time, warning the Texan 
government ... to look to the preservation of their independence, 
as the best security for their ultimate prosperity, both political and 
commercial.” 

France was acquiescent, and on May 29th Aberdeen outlined to 
the Mexican minister at London a plan of operations which he pro- 


A SURVEY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS 


371 


posed to submit to France: (i) Mexico must recognize the inde¬ 
pendence of Texas, and thereby remove, so far as Texas was con¬ 
cerned, one of the principal motives for desiring annexation; (2) 
England would then oppose annexation, and it was believed that 
France would join England not only in guaranteeing the independence 
of Texas, but also the boundaries of Mexico. Aberdeen said: “pro¬ 
vided that England and France were perfectly agreed, it would make 
little difference to England whether or not the American government 
consented to abandon the question; that if it were necessary, England 
would be willing to go to the last extremities in supporting its oppo¬ 
sition to annexation.” 

There were two important provisions here: Mexico must recog¬ 
nize Texan independence, and France must act with England. Before 
the reply of either France or Mexico was obtained Aberdeen received 
a long and able letter from the British minister at Washington. In 
this Pakenham pointed out that although the Senate had rejected the 
treaty, the question was before the country as one of the principal 
issues in the presidential campaign. If Clay were elected by the 
Whigs, annexation would be postponed; but if the Democrats were 
victorious it would be pushed vigorously. The American public was 
already very uneasy concerning British designs in Texas, he said, 
and the surest way to effect the defeat of Clay, and thereby insure 
annexation would be for England to interfere. This argument con¬ 
vinced Aberdeen, and he let the French government know at once 
that England thought it best to defer action for the time. 

On March 29, 1845, after the passage of the joint resolution, and 
when the agent of the United States was hourly expected at the 
Texan capital to offer annexation, Captain Charles Elliot, the British 
charge, and Count de Saligny, the French representative in Texas, 
made a final effort to prevent annexation. They induced President 
Jones to agree not to accept annexation for ninety days, while Elliot 
should go to Mexico and attempt to obtain a recognition of the inde¬ 
pendence of Texas on condition that Texas should pledge itself to 
remain independent. Mexico finally accepted this proposal after 
considerable delay on May 19th. 

In the meantime Major A. J. Donelson had submitted to the Texan 
government the proposal for annexation on the terms of the joint 
resolution. He had received his instructions from Calhoun on March 
3rd, and had been urged to hasten the negotiation, lest England 
exert influence on Texas to reject the proposal. The next day Polk 
was inaugurated and James Buchanan became secretary of state. On 
March 10th he wrote Donelson to try to get Texas to accept the 
proposal without amendment, so as to avoid delay. If the convention 
objected to surrendering the tariff duties of the Republic without the 
assumption of the public debt by the United States, he might suggest 
a resolution offering the public lands for sale to the federal govern- 


372 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ment, and Buchanan expressed confidence that Congress would buy. 
But this should be presented as an independent proposal, and not as 
a condition of accepting annexation. 

That Tyler and Polk were not over sanguine of the acceptance 
of the joint resolution by Texas is manifest from this anxiety, and 
from the arguments with which Donelson urged the proposal. In 
his letter to the Texan secretary of state, Ebenezer Allen, on March 
31, 1845, Donelson said: 

“The undersigned doubts not that there are objections to the terms 
proposed, which under ordinary circumstances ought to be obviated 
before a basis which admits them is adopted. But the circumstances 
are not ordinary, and the objections when weighed in the scale of 
importance with the magnitude of the interests involved in the success 
of the measure, become secondary in their character, and may be 
postponed until the natural course of events removes them. If annexa¬ 
tion should now be lost, it may never be recovered. A patriotic and 
intelligent person, in the pursuit of a measure of general utility, if 
they commit a partial mistake, or inflict temporary injuries, were 
never known to fail in making the proper reparation. If they have 
in this instance made proposals of union to Texas on terms which 
deprive her of means that should be exclusively hers to enable her 
to pay the debt contracted in the war for her independence, it has 
been accidental; and no assurance from the undersigned can be needed 
to give value to the anticipation that such an error will be corrected 
whenever it is communicated to the Government of the United States. 

“It is objected that Texas, in surrendering her revenue from 
customs, parts with the ability to put into efficient organization her 
state government. This objection must result from an undue exami¬ 
nation of the expenditures which the United States, on the other 
hand, will make in the many improvements necessary on the sea- 
coast of Texas, to protect and facilitate her commerce, in the removal 
of obstructions in her numerous bays and rivers, and in the military 
organization necessary to guard her extensive frontier against the in¬ 
roads of a foreign enemy. . . . When expenditures for these and many 
other internal objects are drawn from the treasury of the Union, and 
not from that of Texas, it will be seen that the remaining means 
for the support of the State Government will not only be as great 
as they now are, but rapidly increased by the influx of population 
and the growing capacity resulting from the super-abundance of their 
rich productions. 

“So also, on the part of the United States, it was objected that 
the cession of the unappropriated lands ought to have been made by 
Texas for a fair consideration to enable the Federal Government to 
extend her Indian policy over the various tribes within her limits. The 
right to extinguish the Indian title to lands seems almost a necessary 
consequence of the obligation to regulate the trade and intercourse 


A SURVEY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS 


373 


with them, and to keep them at peace with each other and with us; 
and the absence of any provision to this effect in the terms proposed 
constituted a serious obstacle in the minds of many sincerely friendly 
to the measure. Yet so strong was the desire to put the question 
beyond the possibility of defeat and to leave with Texas the means 
of discharging her national debt, that they nevertheless recorded their 
votes in its favor. 

“But reference is made to such objections, not to ascertain their 
justices or injustices on this occasion, but to remark, on the part of 
the United States, that much was conceded to obtain the passage of 
the resolution. And it was also believed that a like spirit would 
induce Texas to overlook minor considerations, relying on that high 
sense of honor and magnaminity which governs both the people and 
the representatives of the United States, to secure to her hereafter, 
all that she can reasonably desire, to place her on the most favorable 
footing with the other members of the Union.” 

Semi-officially these promises were scattered broadcast and con¬ 
siderably added to. In a letter to the Galveston News, Ashbel Smith, 
under date of January 25, 1876, said: “Major Donelson and other 
official agents sent to Texas by the Federal administration, were 
most lavish in their averments of what the Federal Government would 
do for Texas, so soon as the consumation of annexation would enable 
them to act. . . . The promises were, among others, to clear out our 
rivers for navigation, to deepen the entrances of our harbors, to build 
lighthouses on our coasts for commerce, to erect military works, for¬ 
tifications for the defense of the coast, to execute important works 
of internal improvement, and to do various and sundry other good 
things for Texas, which were beyond our means, or which they could 
and would do for us better than we of ourselves could. Under the 
fostering protection of the United States it was vehemently prophe¬ 
sied that capital would flow into Texas in fertilizing streams to develop 
and utilize our immense natural resources. Employment, wealth, 
prosperity would reign in the land. It would afford the administration 
at Washington the liveliest pleasure to do, in one word, all goodly 
things for us. ...” 

President Jones submitted the question to Congress on June 16, 
1845, along with the Mexican proposal to recognize Texas on condi¬ 
tion of its remaining independent. He had previously pointed out 
that Texas was at peace with the world, that its Indian tribes were 
tranquil, that the receipts had been sufficient to meet the expenditures 
of the government, that the finances were much improved, and con¬ 
gratulated “Congress and the country upon a state of peace, happiness 
and prosperity never before experienced in Texas, and rarely if ever 
equaled by so young a nation.” 

It was plainly Jones’s purpose to show, what was true, that Texas 
had passed the period of its greatest hardships and was now quite 


374 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


able to take care of itself. The people, however, were anxious for 
union with the United States, and Congress accepted the terms of the 
joint resolution by an all but unanimous vote. A convention met on 
July 4th and framed a constitution. It was then adopted and sub¬ 
mitted to the Congress of the United States in December, 1845. Con¬ 
gress approved the constitution on December 29th, and on February 
16, 1846, President Jones yielded the executive office to Governor 
J. Pinckney Henderson. 


CHAPTER XXIX 


THE LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 

By Annie Middleton 

[The selection which follows is made up of extracts from a detailed study 
of the final stage of the annexation movement from the Texan side. It was 
originally published in two parts. The first part, entitled: “Donelson’s Mission 
to Texas in Behalf of Annexation,” is in The Southwestern Historical Quar¬ 
terly, XXIV, 247-291. The second part, “The Texas Convention of 1845,” is 
in the same magazine, Volume XXV, 26-62. Read: Garrison, Texas, Chap¬ 
ter XXI; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 180-187.] 


I. Introductory 

1. Recognition of Texan Independence by the United States 

In the fall of 1835 Texas found herself at war with Mexico. 
This war began as an effort on the part of the Texans to restore the 
“republican principles” of government overthrown by Santa Anna, 
but it soon became a struggle for independence. Although the Texans 
held a consultation at San Felipe in November and organized a pro¬ 
visional government, they remained at least nominally faithful to 
Mexico until the convention met at Washington, Texas, March 1, 
1836. This convention declared the independence of Texas, drew 
up a constitution, and organized a permanent government. Pending 
the adoption of the constitution and the election of officers for the 
new government, the convention created a government ad interim. 

In December, 1835, Governor Smith had directed Branch T. 
Archer, Stephen F. Austin, and William H. Wharton, the commis¬ 
sioners to the United States, to ascertain whether the United States 
would immediately recognize the independence of Texas if she de¬ 
clared her independence; so, after the March convention had declared 
independence and organized a government ad interim, it was natural 
to suppose that the government would push the question of recog¬ 
nition with energy. 

On March 19, David G. Burnet, President of the government ad 
interim, appointed George Childress and Robert Hamilton as agents 
to the United States to open negotiations for “a recognition of the 
Sovereignty and Independence of Texas.” However, he recalled them, 
and appointed James Collinsworth and Peter W. Grayson as corn- 

375 


376 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


missioners to the United States to solicit the recognition of the inde¬ 
pendence of Texas by the United States and the annexation of Texas 
to the United States. Since they did not arrive in Washington until 
July 8, Congress had adjourned. . . . Therefore, when the commis¬ 
sion of Collinsworth and Grayson expired with that of the provisional 
government, October 22, 1836, the status of the question of recogni¬ 
tion was as yet practically untouched so far as any effort on the 
part of the Texas agents was concerned. 

At the general election in September, General Houston was chosen 
President, and M. B. Lamar, Vice-President; and Houston appointed 
Henry Smith, Secretary of the Treasury, and Stephen F. Austin, 
Secretary of State. After the government was organized, President 
Houston appointed William H. Wharton minister to the United States 
“to enter into negotiations and treaties with the United States govern¬ 
ment for the recognition of the independence of Texas.” On Decem¬ 
ber 21, 1836, just three days after Wharton reached Washington, 
President Jackson in his message to Congress advised delay in the 
recognition of Texas independence. However, on January 11, 1837, 
Senator R. J. Walker offered a resolution that “the independent polit¬ 
ical existence of said state be acknowledged by the Government of 
the United States.” On March 1, 1837, the Senate, by a vote of 
twenty-three to nineteen, passed this resolution, and two days later 
President Jackson appointed Alcee La Branche of Louisiana charge 
d’affaires to the Republic of Texas. 

2. Offer of Annexation by Texas 

In November, 1836, President Houston had instructed Wharton 
to make an effort in behalf of annexation, but as John Forsyth, Sec¬ 
retary of State of the United States, thought that annexation should 
be the work of a northern President, nothing beyond recognition 
was gained during President Jackson’s administration. Van Buren 
became President in March, 1837; however, Texas made no effort to 
secure annexation until August. Then Memucan Hunt, the Texan 
minister at Washington, in accordance with the instructions of his 
government, presented to Secretary Forsyth a formal proposition for 
the annexation of Texas. Nevertheless, because of the “furious oppo¬ 
sition of the free States” and the fear of involving the country in 
a war with Mexico that would be branded as an unjust war by enemies 
at home and abroad, President Van Buren would not assent to this 
proposal. The Texan offer remained open until President Houston 
directed its withdrawal in October, 1838; and from that time the 
Texans put new energy into the effort to secure recognition in Europe. 
M. B. Lamar became President of Texas in December, 1838, and in 
his inaugural address he declared strongly against annexation, and 
an almost unanimous vote of Congress sustained him. 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 377 


j. Negotiation of the Annexation Treaty 

Despite the repulse of Texas in her desire for annexation, she 
was the first to return to the subject. In March, 1842, President 
Houston, who began his second term as President of Texas in Decem¬ 
ber, 1841, instructed Isaac Van Zandt, the charge d’affaires from 
Texas to the United States, to study the sentiment of Congress and 
the people relative to annexation and to keep his government advised. 
The United States continued to be indifferent until a truce between 
Texas and Mexico was secured in the summer of 1843 by the efforts 
of the British and French ministers in Mexico. Thereupon, Anson 
Jones, Texan Secretary of State, instructed Van Zandt to make a 
formal statement to the authorities at Washington “that the subject 
of annexation was not open to discussion.’’ In the words of Jones: 
“This aroused all the dormant jealousies and fears of that government, 
the apathy of seven years’ sleep over the question was shaken off, 
and a treaty of annexation was proposed to be celebrated.” 

The uneasiness thus awakened at Washington was much increased 
by reports that the British were using their influence in Texas to 
abolish slavery. As these reports continued to reach Washington, 
President Tyler and A. P. Upshur, the United States Secretary of 
State, came to the conclusion that British influence was working 
strongly in Texas, and that the one aim of Great Britain was to secure 
the abolition of slavery in that republic. Therefore, they decided to 
forestall such an event by concluding a treaty of annexation. 

The negotiations, so far as they are on record, began October 16, 
1843, a letter from Upshur to Van Zandt offering to reopen the 
subject. Van Zandt sent to Texas for instructions, but President 
Houston assumed an attitude of indifference and caution, as he thought 
the chances for the ratification of the treaty by the United States 
Senate were not favorable, and, if it should fail, the alienation of 
England would leave Texas in an awkward position. Therefore, he 
demanded that the United States should place troops near the Texas 
border during the time of the negotiations, and that the United States 
should guarantee the independence of Texas, if the treaty should fail. 

W. S. Murphy, the United States charge to Texas, assented to the 
first condition, but not to the second. Nevertheless, President Hous¬ 
ton appointed J. P. Henderson to cooperate with Van Zandt in the 
negotiation of the proposed treaty. Upshur had been killed by acci¬ 
dent on February 28, and President Tyler had appointed John C. 
Calhoun to succeed him; so it was with him that the Texan charges 
negotiated the treaty. 

On April 22, President Tyler sent the treaty to the Senate for 
ratification. Although he urged its adoption in the message accom¬ 
panying the treaty, it was rejected, June 8, 1844, by a vote of thirty- 
five to sixteen. The opposition contended that the annexation of 


378 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Texas would favor the extension and perpetuation of slavery, and 
that Mexico would consider such a step as a just cause for war. 

In the meantime Henry Clay and Martin Van Buren had come 
out against annexation; the Whig and Democratic conventions had 
been held; Henry Clay had been nominated for the presidency by 
the Whigs and James K. Polk by the Democrats; and the annexation 
question had been made a plank in the Democratic platform. . . . 

[Polk and the Democrats won the election in November, 1844. 
Then, without waiting for the new administration, President Tyler 
submitted to Congress a recommendation for immediate annexation.] 


II. The United States Offers Annexation 


1. Passage of the Joint Resolution by the United States Congress 

As a basis for the annexation of Texas, President Tyler in his 
annual message of December, 1844, recommended that Congress adopt 
the rejected treaty “in the form of a joint resolution, or act,” “to be 
perfected and made binding on the two countries, when adopted 
in like manner by the government of Texas.” Thereupon a contest 
immediately arose over the form of annexation. Within a week after 
the session began, C. J. Ingersoll in the House and George McDuffie 
in the Senate, at the suggestion of President Tyler, introduced the 
terms of the treaty in the form of a joint resolution. However, 
because of the strong opposition, especially in the Senate, Congress 
did not adopt the resolution until February 28, 1845, and then in 
the following form: 




1. Resolved, by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United 
States of America in Congress assembled.—That Congress doth consent that 
the territory properly included within, and rightfully belonging to, the Republic 
of Texas, may be erected into a new State, to be called the State of Texas, 
with a republican form of government, to be adopted by the people of the said 
republic, by deputies in convention assembled, with the consent of the existing 
government, in order that the same may be admitted as one of the States of 
this Union. 

2. And be it further resolved,—That the foregoing consent of Congress is 
given upon the following conditions, and with the following guarantees, to 
wit:—First, Said State to be formed, subject to the adjustment by this Govern¬ 
ment of all questions of boundary that may arise with other Governments; 
and the Constitution thereof, with the proper evidence of its adoption by the 
people of said Republic of Texas, shall be transmitted to the President of the 
United States, to be laid before Congress for its final action, on or before the 
first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and forty-six. Second, said 
State, when admitted into the Union, after ceding to the United States all 
public edifices, fortifications, barracks, ports and harbors, navy and navy yards, 
docks, magazines, arms, armaments, and all other property and means per¬ 
taining to the public defence, belonging to said Republic of Texas, shall retain 
all the public funds, debts, taxes, and dues of every kind, which may belong 
to, or be due and owing said republic; and shall also retain all the vacant and 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 379 

r!r iat ^ d lands iying withm its limits, to be applied to the payment of 
Lnrff £ an ^ liabilities of said Republic of Texas, and the residue of said 
lands, after discharging said debts and liabilities, to be disposed of as said 
State may direct; but in no event are said debts and liabilities to become a 
charge upon the Government of the United States. Third, New States of con¬ 
venient size, not exceeding four in number, in addition to said State of Texas 
and having sufficient population, may hereafter, by the consent of said State’ 
be /° r T d 0Ut .® f the territory thereof, which shall be entitled to admission 
under ^the provisions of the Federal Constitution. And such States as may be 
formed out of that portion of said territory lying south of thirty-six degrees 
thirty minutes north latitude, commonly known as the Missouri Compromise 
line, shall be admitted into the Union, with or without slavery, as the people 
of each State asking admission, may desire. And in such States as shall be 
formed out of said territory, north of said Missouri Compromise line, slavery 
or involuntary servitude (except for crime) shall be prohibited 

3- And be it further resolved,-That if the President of the United States 
shall in his judgment and discretion, deem it most advisable, instead of pro¬ 
ceeding to submit the foregoing resolution to the Republic of Texas, as an 
overture on the part of the United States for admission, to negotiate with 
that republic-then Be it resolved,-That a State, to be formed out of the 
present Republic of Texas, with suitable extent and boundaries, and with two 
representatives in Congress, until the next apportionment of representation, 
shall be admitted into the Union, by virtue of this act, on an equal footing 
with the existing States, as soon as the terms and conditions of such admis- 
sion and the cession of the remaining Texan territory to the United States, 
shall be agreed upon by the Governments of Texas and the United States • 
and that the sum of one hundred thousand dollars be, and the same is hereby, 
appropriated to defray the expenses of missions and negotiations, to agree upon 
the terms of said admission and cession, either by treaty to be submitted to 
the Senate, or by articles to be submitted to the two Houses of Congress, as 
the President may direct.” 


Because of the bitter fight in the Senate, the joint resolution, as 
we see, consisted of two parts: the one, embraced in the first and 
second sections, the original House resolution; the other, the third 
section, the amendment passed by the Senate and concurred in by 
the House, authorizing the President to use his. discretion in propos¬ 
ing to Texas a new negotiation. 

After deliberately considering the joint resolution and the amend¬ 
ment, President Tyler chose the House resolution, as it could be 
more readily and with less difficulty and expense carried into effect.” 
His decisive objection to the amendment was that “it must be sub¬ 
mitted to the Senate for approval, and run the hazard of receiving 
the votes of two-thirds of the members present, which could hardly 
be expected, if we are to judge from recent experience.” 


2. Donelson s Instructions Concerning the Joint Resolution 

Since it could scarcely be doubted that the English would use every 
effort to “induce Texas to reject the terms proposed,” Calhoun 
instructed Andrew Jackson Donelson, the special representative of 


380 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the United States government, to “proceed at once to Texas” and 
“urge speedy and prompt action.” . . . 

j. Efforts of the French and English to Defeat. Annexation, 

On arriving at Galveston, Donelson was informed that the Eng¬ 
lish and French ministers, Captain Charles Elliot and Count de 
Saligny, after receiving dispatches by an English man-of-war from 
their respective governments, had hastily set out for Washington, 
Texas. Moreover, the public believed that the ministers had been 
instructed to guarantee the recognition of the independence of Texas 
by Mexico and other favorable propositions in the form of commer¬ 
cial advantages, if Texas would refuse to accept the American propo¬ 
sitions. Donelson was, therefore, very anxious to reach Washington 
as soon as the other gentlemen; accordingly, he . . . “put off after 
them.” . . . 

On arriving at Washington, Elliot and Saligny formally invited 
President Jones, on behalf of his government, to accept the good offices 
of France and England with a view to an early and honorable settle¬ 
ment with Mexico upon the basis of independence. After a confer¬ 
ence with his cabinet, President Jones instructed Ashbel Smith, the 
Secretary of State, to accept this intervention. Accordingly Smith 
prepared a draft preliminary to a treaty of peace between Texas and 
Mexico: (i) that Mexico should consent to acknowledge the inde¬ 
pendence of Texas; (2) that limits and other conditions should be 
arranged in the final treaty; (3) that Texas should be willing to 
submit disputed points respecting territory and other matters to the 
arbitration of umpires. Furthermore, that Texas should pledge her¬ 
self to issue a proclamation announcing the conclusion of the pre¬ 
liminaries of peace with Mexico as soon as Mexico accepted the 
conditions and returned them to the President of Texas, and that she 
should agree “not to accept any proposals, or to enter into any negotia¬ 
tions to annex herself to any other country” for a period of ninety 
days from the date of this memorandum. 

After a personal pledge on the part of Saligny and Elliot that only 
the courts of London and Paris, their ministers at Washington, and 
the Mexican government should know of the agreement, Smith, Elliot, 
and Saligny signed the document. Thereupon, Elliot offered to make 
a secret journey to Mexico, in order to secure an exact conformity to 
the preliminary arrangements. Under a pretext of a journey to 
Charleston, South Carolina, he left Texas on the Electro, and when 
out of sight of land, was transferred to another British ship bound 
for Vera Cruz. 

While at Washington Elliot and Saligny had insisted that Texas 
have a representative at the courts of France and England with full 
powers to conclude any arrangement that might be necessary for the 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 381 


safety of the country. They said that they would consider it as strik¬ 
ing proof of the “good disposition of this Government at this crisis, 
if His Excellency would send back his present Secretary of State, 
who was known and highly appreciated” both in London and Paris, 
and, therefore, could be of the “highest use.” President Jones com¬ 
plied with their request and appointed Smith to this office. At the 
request of his cabinet he appointed E. Allen, “a man of excellent sense, 
high character, and of the best disposition in this matter,” to succeed 
Smith, as Secretary of State, as he knew that it would require a 
person like Smith with “the utmost firmness and caution,” to manage 
affairs with success. 


4. The Convening of the Texan Congress 

When Donelson arrived at Washington, Texas, March 30, he could 
find out nothing concerning the mission of Elliot and Saligny. . . . 
On the afternoon of his arrival, he called upon Ashbel Smith and 
presented the substance of the American proposition for the admission 
of Texas, but Smith seemed uncertain as to the course the President 
would pursue. So Donelson, thereupon, presented himself to Presi¬ 
dent Jones, who informed him that he had granted Smith a leave of 
absence, and that he had appointed E. Allen to carry on the negotia¬ 
tions. During the interview the President said that he had intended 
to call Congress, but, under the circumstances, as now presented, he 
believed that a better course would be to refer the subject directly 
to the people, and let them provide for a convention to effect the 
changes necessary for admission into the Union. He added, how¬ 
ever, “that the gravity of the subject required him not to act in 
haste; and that, though he had a decided opinion of his own, he would 
dwell awhile on it, until he was aided by his cabinet.” . . . 

In public estimation of Texans the government of Texas had not 
responded with sufficient promptness to the overtures of the American 
government; so, while Donelson was wrestling with this great measure 
in a diplomatic way, enthusiastic annexation meetings were held 
throughout Texas, and county after county indorsed the terms offered 
by the United States, and demanded prompt action either by Congress 
or by a convention. 

In a mass meeting at Brenham, April n, the people declared unani¬ 
mously for annexation, and recommended that all the counties elect 
representatives to a convention to ratify the joint resolution and form 
a state constitution, if President Jones did not convene Congress on 
or before the fourth Monday in June. 

The Brazoria annexation meeting, April 14, was also indicative 
of the great anxiety of the people to act definitely and promptly. The 
chairman, Timothy Pilsbury, explained the object of the meeting, and 
appointed a committee to draft resolutions. While this was in retire- 


382 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ment, Tod Robinson addressed the meeting. After this the committee 
reported the resolutions, which were unanimously adopted. These 
expressed a desire for immediate annexation, with or without the 
consent of the Jones administration. They instructed the members 
of Congress to meet at Washington the third Monday in May and 
assume conventional powers, and, acting with the members of other 
counties, to call a convention and apportion the representation accord¬ 
ing to population so as to represent “the people and not acres.” There 
was, also, a committee appointed to prepare an “Address to the People” 
calling upon them to meet and to insist upon the President’s convening 
Congress. Guy M. Bryan carried a copy of the proceedings to James 
Love at Galveston, and a mass meeting in that city a few days later 
strongly indorsed the action of Brazoria. 

The meeting at Houston on the ninth anniversary of the battle 
of San Jacinto showed the attitude of a majority of the Texans toward 
the Americans. They expressed their willingness to enter the Ameri¬ 
can Union on the basis of the terms offered, and declared their “full 
confidence in the honor and justice of the American people” and their 
belief that the people of the United States would ultimately extend 
to them “every privilege that freemen can grant without dishonor and 
freemen can accept without disgrace.” 

The news of the American proposal spread like “wild fire” through¬ 
out the Republic so that by April 12, almost every county in the 
Republic had held a public demonstration or had set a day for one. 
These meetings were almost unanimous in their demands for prompt 
action, and the papers contained little else than accounts of these 
enthusiastic annexation meetings. 

This excerpt from Ashbel Smith’s letter to Jones as he was leav¬ 
ing Galveston as minister to England and France, April 9, is further 
evidence of the excitement about annexation: 


... I find everywhere very great, very intense feeling on the subject of 
annexation. ... I am forced to believe that an immense majority of the citizens 
are in favor of annexation—that is, annexation as presented in the resolutions 
of the American Congress—and that they will continue to be so, in preference 
to independence, though recognized in the most liberal manner by Mexico. 
The tranquility at present arises from the confidence in your favorable dispo¬ 
sitions towards annexation, and the assurance that you will soon present the 
matter in some definite form to the country, so as to enable the people to 
vote in favor of it. This I know is your purpose; but should a suspicion to 
the contrary arise, and should it be suspected that the matter was to be de¬ 
ferred till the European powers could in any wise be heard from or be con¬ 
sulted, especially England, I am certainly informed that an attempt will be 
made to convene a convention, by calling on the people in public meetings, 
for the purpose of overriding the Government,—in other words, an attempt 
will be made to plunge the country into a revolution. The plan has been 
matured in Harris, Brazoria, and Galveston counties. . . . When it is known 
that I am going to Europe, as it will be when I sail from the United States, 
I feel convinced that public opinion will be inflamed beyond control. . . . Invi- 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 383 


tations will issue from meetings claiming to represent the popular will, urging 
the people to meet without delay and elect delegates to a convention, for the 
purpose of exercising all the powers of government. . . . 

On looking over what I have written, I see that I have understated rather 
than overstated the feeling on this subject and the importance that will be 
attached to my mission when known. I am sure its tendency will be to pre¬ 
vent the dispassionate consideration by the people of the grave matter about to 
be submitted to them; and I am really apprehensive that an attempt may be 
made to subvert our institutions. . . . 

As the people had so unanimously expressed a desire for prompt 
action on the American proposal, and as Donelson had met with little 
encouragement at Washington, he decided to go to Huntsville for a 
conference with Houston, whom he found strongly opposed to the 
joint resolution, but in favor of the negotiations contemplated in 
the Senate amendment. Donelson tried to satisfy him, but he still 
insisted upon opening negotiations, feeling that “Texas should have 
something to say about the matter,” which would be impracticable 
with the resolutions. . . . 

As a substitute for the terms of the joint resolution Houston sug¬ 
gested: (i) that the United States should receive and pay a liberal 
price for the public property of the Republic; (2) that Texas should 
retain her public lands; (3) that the United States should indemnify 
the citizens of Texas for any lands in territory abandoned by the 
United States; (4) that arrangements should be made for the United 
States to purchase the vacant lands of Texas at a price stipulated by 
commissioners; (5) that lands purchased by the United States should 
not be sold to any Indian tribe, nor should Indians be permitted to 
settle within the present limits of Texas without the consent of the 
Senate of Texas; (6) that Texas should pay its national debt; (7) 
that the United States should pay the Texas citizens for lands within 
its boundary lines; and (8) that Texas should not form a part of the 
Union until her Constitution was accepted by the Congress of the 
United States. . . . 

Since the people had made known their desire to President Jones 
in a way too plain to be misunderstood, he became convinced that the 
only safe thing for him to do was to call Congress in session. There¬ 
fore, in an interview with Donelson on April 12, he assured him that 
“regardless of his individual opinion,” he would submit the proposi¬ 
tion “fairly and promptly” to Congress, so that Congress could appor¬ 
tion the districts for the election of the deputies to a convention to 
test the ratification of the proposals, and to make the corresponding 
changes in the government. . . . Accordingly, on April 15, President 
Jones issued a proclamation calling a special session of Congress 
to meet at Washington, June 16, to “receive such communications 
as may be made to them, and to consult and determine on such 
measures as in their wisdom may be deemed necessary for the welfare 
of Texas.” 


384 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


President Jones caused much dissatisfaction by delaying the con¬ 
vening of Congress until June 16, as the people generally believed 
that he was waiting for the English and French to have an oppor¬ 
tunity to defeat annexation by forcing Mexico to recognize the inde¬ 
pendence of Texas. However, Jones justified his action on the 
grounds that the delay was unavoidable, as the members could not 
have assembled earlier because of the water courses throughout the 
country having overflowed. . . . 

5. The Calling of the Convention 

As one of the conditions of the joint resolution for the admission 
of Texas was that Texas might be erected into a new state, to be 
called the state of Texas, with a republican form of government, to 
be adopted by the people in convenion assembled, the friends of 
annexation were not content with the call of Congress, but clamored 
for a convention, since Congress could not apportion the representa¬ 
tion or form a new constitution. However, there was a great diversity 
of opinion relative to the calling of the convention. Some of the 
counties desired to meet in primary assemblies and elect their delegates 
to a convention previous to the meeting of Congress; others desired 
that Congress should assemble in May, apportion the representation 
according to population, and designate the day for the convention; 
while others preferred that the President should apportion the repre¬ 
sentation and call a convention. This diversity of opinion threatened 
to lead to serious difficulties, and the enemies of annexation began 
to predict that a firebrand would be thrown into Congress as soon 
as it met and that a contest would begin immediately between the 
eastern and the western members over representation in the con¬ 
vention. 

This disagreement over representation was due to the fact that 
the general convention at Washington in March, 1836, had designated 
the membership in Congress before Santa Anna invaded and depopu¬ 
lated the western counties, with the result that this section of the 
Republic, with only about one-third of the whole population, had in 
Congress a majority over the other two-thirds. Nevertheless, it had 
been impossible to correct these inequalities, as the constitution for¬ 
bade a reapportionment of the representatives until a census was 
taken, which so far the western members had been able to prevent. 
The West claimed that the present basis was fair and just, as this 
region had always borne the brunt of the war while its population had 
been decreased and immigration had been prevented by the Mexican 
invasion. Regardless of this fact, however, the other parts of the 
Republic were not satisfied with their representation, as “they had 
the burden of taxation to bear, while the West received all the 
benefits.” 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 385 


After President Jones issued the proclamation convening Congress, 
this question of representation became very acute as some of the most 
influential members of the West declared “that they now had the power 
in Congress, and would keep it in the State Government by appor¬ 
tioning the members of the convention in such a manner as to per¬ 
petuate the old basis.” 

As this question of representation carried with it the location 
of the capital, the West was even more persistent in its demand that 
the basis then existing should be maintained in the convention, for 
it desired to make Austin the permanent capital. . . . 

On May 5, 1845, Jones issued the following proclamation: 

Whereas the people of Texas have evinced a decided wish that prompt 
and definite action should be had upon the proposition for annexation recently 
submitted by the government of the United States to this government, and that 
a convention should be assembled for this purpose; and 

Whereas it is competent for the people alone to decide finally upon the 
proposition for annexation, and, by deputies in convention assembled, to adopt 
a contsitution with a view to the admission of Texas as one of the States of 
the American Union; and 

Whereas no authority is given by the constitution of this republic to any 
branch of the government to call a convention and to change the organic law— 
this being a right reserved to the people themselves, and which they alone can 
properly exercise— 

Therefore, be it known that I, Anson Jones, President of the republic of 
Texas, desirous of giving direction and effect to the public will, already so 
fully expressed, do recommend to the citizens of Texas that an election for 
“deputies” to a convention be held in the different counties of the republic 
on Wednesday, the fourth day of June next, upon the following basis, viz.: 
Each county in the republic to elect one deputy, irrespective of the number of 
voters it contained at the last annual elections; each county voting at that time 
three hundred, and less than six hundred, to elect two deputies; each county 
voting at that time six hundred, and less than nine hundred, to elect three 
deputies; and each county voting at that time nine hundred and upwards, to 
elect four deputies . . . and that the said deputies so elected do assemble in 
convention at the city of Austin, on the “fourth of July” next, for the purpose 
of considering the proposition for the annexation of Texas to the United States, 
and any other proposition which may be made concerning the nationality of 
the republic, and should they judge it expedient and proper, to adopt, pro¬ 
visionally, a constitution to be submitted to the people for their ratification, 
with the view to the admission of Texas, as a State, into the American Union, 
in accordance with the terms of the proposition for annexation already sub¬ 
mitted to this government by that of the United States. And the chief justices 
of the respective counties aforesaid will give due notice of the said elections, 
appoint a presiding officer in the several precincts, who will appoint the judges 
and clerks of said elections, and have the same conducted according to the 
constitution and laws regulating elections, and make due return thereof. . . . 

6 . Mexico's Acceptance of the Proposals of Texas 

On May 19, 1845, almost a month after Elliot had arrived in 
Mexico, the Mexican government accepted the conditions preliminary 
to a treaty of peace with Texas, but President Herrera requested 


386 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


that the person or persons sent to Texas to conclude the treaty of 
peace should take the title of commissioner or commissioners, and 
that the instant the negotiations should commence, they should bring 
forward their title of plenipotentiary. Moreover, Luis Cuevas, the 
Secretary of State, in an additional declaration asserted that if Texas 
should consent either directly or indirectly, to the “law passed in the 
United States on Annexation,” then this agreement entered into be¬ 
tween Texas and Mexico should be considered “null and void.” On 
May 20, Bankhead, the British minister in Mexico, transmitted to 
Elliot this document containing the acceptance of the Texan pro¬ 
posals, and instructed him to present it secretly to President Jones 
as soon as possible. Whereupon, Elliot immediately left Mexico for 
Texas by the way of Vera Cruz. 

Elliot, according to his instructions, had expected to keep the 
negotiation a secret, but on arriving at Galveston, May 30, he found 
the strength and unanimity of the annexation cry so great that he 
made known the terms of the preliminary treaty. Donelson was at 
Iberville, Louisiana, when he heard that Texas and Mexico had 
entered into a preliminary treaty recognizing the independence of 
Texas. Before this he had heard rumors of the intrigue, but he had 
discredited them, and had repeatedly assured his government that 
there was nothing in the reports of British interference. However, 
when he received authentic information that the treaty had been 
accepted by Mexico, he hastened to Galveston. Here he met Elliot, 
who had just arrived from Mexico, and found out from him the 
exact terms of the proposal carried to Mexico. 

Elliot set out for Washington on the first day of June, and hurried 
on without even pausing for rest. He reached his destination on 
June 3, and promptly delivered the documents to President Jones, 
who assured him that he would not fail to “fulfil what he considered 
his obligation towards his own country, towards Mexico, and towards 
the powers who had interested themselves in the peaceful and honor¬ 
able settlement of this struggle, and that he would, therefore, in the 
course of a few days issue a proclamation setting forth the actual 
situation of affairs as they existed between Mexico and the people 
of this country, and then leave it to them and their constitutional 
agents to dispose of the result as they should judge best.” Accord¬ 
ingly, on June 4, President Jones issued this proclamation giving an 
account of the circumstances which preceded and led up to the nego¬ 
tiation with Mexico, and proclaiming a “cessation of hostilities against 
Mexico”: 

The Executive is now enabled to declare to the people of Texas the actual 
state of their affairs with respect to Mexico, to the end that they may direct 
and dispose them as they shall judge best for the honor and permanent interests 
of the republic. 

During the course of the last winter it reached the knowledge of the 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 387 


Executive, from various sources of information, unofficial indeed, but still 
worthy of attention and credit, that the late and present government of Mexico 
were disposed to a peaceful settlement of the difficulties with Texas by the 
acknowledgment of our independence, upon the understanding that Texas 
would maintain her separate existence. No action, however, could be taken 
upon the subject, because nothing authentic was known until the month of 
March last, when the representatives of France and Great Britain near this 
government jointly and formally renewed the offer of the good offices of those 
powers with Mexico for the early and peaceful settlement of this struggle, 
upon the basis of the acknowledgment of our independence by that republic. 

It would have been the imperative duty of the Executive at once to reject 
these offers if they had been accompanied by conditions of any kind whatever. 
But, with attentive watchfulness in that respect, and great disinclination to 
entangling alliances of any description, or with any power, he must declare, 
in a spirit of justice, that no terms or conditions have ever been proposed by 
the two governments in question, or either of them, as the consideration of 
their friendly interposition. 

Maturely considering the situation of affairs at that time, the Executive 
felt that it was incumbent upon him not to reject this opportunity of securing 
the people of this country, untrammeled by conditions, a peaceful, honorable, 
and advantageous settlement of their difficulties with Mexico, if they should 
see fit to adopt that mode of adjustment. 

Thus influenced, he accepted the good offices of the two powers, which, with 
those of the United States, had been previously invoked by Texas, and placed 
in the hands of their representatives a statement of conditions preliminary to 
a treaty of peace, which he declared he should be ready to submit to the people 
of this country for their decision and action as soon as they were adopted by 
the government of Mexico. . . . 

Whereas authentic proof has recently been laid before me, to the effect 
that the Congress of Mexico has authorized the government to open negotia¬ 
tions and conclude a treaty with Texas, subject to the examination and appro¬ 
bation of that body; and further, that the government of Mexico has accepted 
the conditions prescribed on the part of Texas as preliminary to a final and 
definitive treaty of peace: 

Therefore I, Anson Jones, President of the republic of Texas, and com¬ 
mander-in-chief of the army and navy and militia thereof, do hereby make 
known these circumstances to the citizens of this republic, till the same can 
be more fully communicated to the honorable Congress and convention of the 
people, for their lawful action, at the period of their assembling on the 16th 
June and 4th July next; and pending the said action, by virtue of the authority 
in me vested, I do hereby declare and proclaim a cessation of hostilities by 
land and by sea, against the republic of Mexico, or against the citizens and 
trade thereof. 

7. Texan Opposition to the Preliminary Treaty with Mexico 

The anti-administration party took the position that President 
Jones had entered into this negotiation with Mexico to create an issue 
on which a majority of the people would unite against the American 
proposal. Therefore, a storm of protest arose. “We are informed,” 
said the editors of the New Orleans Courier, June 24, “that the 
feelings of the whole population are aroused to the highest pitch 
by the treacherous conduct of Jones and by his intention, if left to 


388 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


himself, to throw the republic into the arms of England.” Ashbel 
Smith said that the people appeared frantic in their hostility to the 
negotiation. 

Donelson thought that the negotiation with Mexico “was nothing 
more nor less than a contrivance of Great Britain to defeat annexa¬ 
tion or to involve Mexico in war with the United States,” as Elliot 
on his return announced that hostilities would ensue if Texas accepted 
the American proposition. To meet this emergency and to counter¬ 
act the effect of Elliot’s reports, Donelson, keeping within the limits 
of his instructions of May 23, prepared a “paper for the Texas 
government,” in which he again pledged the forces of the United 
States to protect Texas as soon as the government accepted the pro¬ 
posed terms. . . . 

As such a large majority of the friends of annexation condemned 
President Jones in unmeasured terms for entering into the negotia¬ 
tion with Mexico, Jones wrote to the editor of the Civilian and Gazette 
(Galveston), defending his course. . . . 

Despite the fact that the anti-administration party condemned 
President Jones so severely for entering into the preliminary treaty 
with Mexico, Wm. B. Ochiltree, a strong annexationist of Houston, 
said that it was the duty of the President to accept the offices of the 
foreign powers to obtain from Mexico the terms upon which she 
would be willing to acknowledge the independence of Texas, and 
that since President Jones had stated the terms, and Mexico had 
accepted them, that he was in duty bound to submit these proposi¬ 
tions to Congress, as the constitution required the President to submit 
all documents in the nature of a treaty to the Senate. Furthermore, 
if he had rejected the offer on his own responsibility, that he would 
have been liable to censure. 


8 . The Texan Congress Accepts the American Proposal 

After the President issued the proclamation making known the 
negotiation with Mexico, nothing else of importance occurred relative 
to annexation until Congress met, June 16. As soon as Congress was 
organized, President Jones presented both the American and the 
Mexican propositions, in accordance with his previous announcement, 
so the alternative of annexation or independence was thus placed 
before the people, and their “free, sovereign, and unbiased voice” 
was to determine “the all important issue.” In his message, he 
assured the members of Congress that in so far as it should depend 
upon the executive to act, he would give immediate and full effect 
to their expressed will. 

Two bills relative to annexation were introduced in Congress, 
one in each house, and were unanimously adopted, but, as the bills 
were different in some respects, neither house was willing to accept 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 389 


the bill of the other. Therefore, a committee of conference was 
chosen by the two houses to effect a compromise. The substitute bill 
recommended by the committee was adopted and promptly signed 
by President Jones. . . . 


p. The Convention Accepts Annexation 

Of the sixty-one deputies to be elected to the convention, Presi¬ 
dent Jones apportioned fourteen from the twelve western counties, 
eleven from the five northern, thirteen from the eight eastern, and 
twenty-three from the eleven middle. According to the votes cast 
at the last annual election, this gave an average of one deputy for 
every one hundred and fifty-four voters in the West, for every two 
hundred and twenty-seven in the North and East, and for every two 
hundred and twenty-three in the middle counties. 

This basis of representation was more favorable to the West than 
its most enthusiastic advocates could have expected to obtain from 
Congress; therefore, all party dissension, all petty jealousies, and all 
antipathies were forgotten. Moreover, numerous sources of evidence 
emphasize the fact that this apportionment was satisfactory not only 
to the West but also to every other section of the Republic. . . . 

During the month of May, almost every county in the Republic 
held public demonstrations endorsing the action of President Jones 
in calling the convention. The mass meeting held at Brenham, May 
12, is one of the many instances in which the people publicly ex¬ 
pressed a desire to consummate annexation speedily on the basis of 
the American proposal. At this meeting the people expressed their 
approval of the President’s proclamation, instructed their senators 
and representatives to accept the joint resolution as soon as possible 
after Congress had assembled, urged all the counties to elect delegates 
to the convention on June 4, and appointed a committee of five to 
assist in carrying out the measure of annexation by corresponding 
with other committees in the Republic. Despite the fact, however, 
that the people had expressed so enthusiastically their preference 
for annexation, on May 14 a public meeting at Bastrop condemned 
the President for calling the convention, and on June 19, the anti¬ 
annexationists met at Crockett and agreed to use all honorable means 
in their power “to perpetuate inviolate the independent national exist¬ 
ence of the Republic of Texas.” 

Heretofore, the middle and eastern counties had been the bitterest 
opponents of the President, but in the calling of the convention they 
gave him their unanimous support, as their main object was to secure 
annexation with as much unanimity and as little delay as was prac¬ 
ticable, and they believed that this act settled annexation so far as 
it rested with the people of Texas. Another reason for endorsing the 
President’s action was that they considered a united cooperation of 


390 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the people with the executive and legislative branches as the only 
possible means of effecting annexation, since the whole proceeding 
was extra-constitutional, and since it was only by the consent of 
the government then existing that any steps taken for effecting an 
organic change in the laws could become valid. Regardless of this 
fact, however, some of the anti-party men still desired to overthrow 
the Jones administration. In consequence of this, the Texas National 
Register urged the opponents of the President to “abstain from any 
violent and irregular proceedings, and not to attempt to disorganize 
the present Government,” as they had threatened to do. 

On the day appointed by the President, every county in the 
Republic held the elections, which were generally characterized by 
good order and harmony, but which in a few instances ended in most 
shameful rows. Since the people considered that their dearest inter¬ 
ests would be in jeopardy in the convention, they elected their most 
experienced and ablest champions to represent them in the new polit¬ 
ical arena, but only two of the delegates chosen were native Texans. 
The others were former citizens of the United States, a majority 
of whom had come to Texas during the era of the Republic. 

The convention had been called to meet at Austin, July 4, 1845, 
but as a majority of the delegates elect were in the city before the 
appointed time, an informal meeting was held in the afternoon of 
July 3. After some discussion, Thomas J. Rusk, acting as chairman 
of the meeting, appointed a committee of fifteen to draft an “ordi¬ 
nance expressive of the consent of the people of Texas to the terms, 
conditions, and guarantees” contained in the joint resolution. The 
members of this committee were: A. S. Lipscomb, Francis Moore, 
James Love, Isaac Van Zandt, Wm. L. Cazneau, L. D. Evans, H. G. 
Runnels, John Hemphill, J. Pinckney Henderson, J. M. Lewis, R. 
E. B. Baylor, James Davis, G. W. Smith, John Caldwell, and G. A. 
Everts. These met in the evening, and remained in session until al¬ 
most midnight before they accepted the terms offered in the first and 
second sections of the joint resolution for annexing Texas to the 
United States. 

The convention that held its first formal meeting at the capital 
on the morning of July 4, is generally conceded to have been the 
“ablest political body that ever assembled in Texas,” and “it may 
be seriously doubted whether at the present time a body of delegates 
could be selected who would represent an equal variety of legal 
knowledge and an equally extensive experience in the administration 
of laws.” They exhibited a great diversity of opinions, wishes, and 
views, and the very object for which they had assembled was of such 
a nature as to develop the most conflicting opinions and the most 
opposite theories. Therefore, it was often necessary to effect a com¬ 
promise before a satisfactory agreement could be reached. 

When the session opened, H. G. Runnels formally proposed 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 391 


Thomas J. Rusk for President, and as no other names were offered, 
the convention declared him “duly and unanimously elected. ,, He 
then addressed the assembly, saying: 

. . . The objects for which we have assembled deeply interest the people 
of Texas. We have the hopes of our present population as well as of the 
millions who may come after us in our hands. . . . 

Let us then lay aside all minor considerations, and avoid all subjects cal¬ 
culated to divide us in opinion, and let us march boldly and confidently up 
to the formation of a Constitution, which, while it secures our own rights, 
shall satisfy our friends abroad, and meet the sanction of God to whose boun¬ 
tiful providence Texas is already so much indebted. While we insert these 
great principles which have been sanctioned by time and experience, we should 
be careful to avoid the introduction of new and untried theories. We should 
leave those who are to follow us free to adopt such amendments to the system 
as their experience and intelligence shall suggest and their circumstances render 
necessary. We have one great object in view, and that is to enter the American 
Confederacy with becoming dignity and respect. 

After the address the convention completed its organization by elect¬ 
ing J. H. Raymond, secretary, Wm. Cockburn, doorkeeper, W. Haynie, 
chaplain, and F. G. Fisher, interpreter. 

In order to facilitate the work of the convention, President Rusk 
appointed five standing committees, namely: on the State of the 
Nation, and on the Executive, Legislative, Judiciary, and General 
Provisions of the constitution. He, also, appointed a committee of 
five to prepare rules for the convention. Isaac Van Zandt was chair¬ 
man of the committee on General Provisions and a member of the 
committee on rules. 

The following is a list of delegates elected to the convention : 

Austin county—Oliver Jones and P. M. Cuney. 

Brazoria—H. G. Runnels and R. M. Forbes. 

Brazos—Samuel Lusk. 

Bastrop—John Caldwell. 

Colorado—G. W. Brown. 

Fannin—G. A. Everts and Lemuel Evans. 

Fort Bend—J. B. Miller. 

Fayette—R. E. B. Baylor and J. S. Mayfield. 

Galveston—R. Bache and J. Love. 

Goliad—Wm. L. Hunter. 

Gonzales—John D. Anderson. 

Houston—Isaac Parker and P. O. Lumpkin. 

Harris—Francis Moore, I. W. Brashear, and Alex McGowan. 

Harrison—Isaac Van Zandt, S. Holland, and Edward Clark. 

Jasper—G. W. Smith. 

Jefferson—J. Armstrong. 

Jackson—F. M. White. 

Liberty—J. Davis and G. T. Wood. 


392 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Lamar—G. W. Wright and H. R. Latimer. 

Montgomery—Sam Houston, James Scott, and A. McNeil. 

Matagorda—A. C. Horton. 

Milam—I. Standefer. 

Nacogdoches—T. J. Rusk, J. L. Hogg, and C. T. Taylor. 

Rusk—David Gage. 

Robertson—H. J. Jewett and C. Armstrong. 

Refugio—J. Powers. 

Red River—T. C. Young, A. H. Latimer, and J. T. Mills. 

San Augustine—J. P. Henderson and N. H. Darnell. 

Shelby—R. Rains and A. W. O. Hicks. 

Sabine—J. M. Burroughs. 

San Patricio—H. L. Kinney. 

Travis—W. L. Cazneau. 

Victoria—A. S. Cunningham. 

Washington—A. S. Lipscomb, J. Hemphill, and V. R. Irion. 

The convention being duly organized, the communication from 
President Jones was read, the contents of which are given below: 

In compliance with one of the provisions of a Joint Resolution of the 
present Congress, entitled “A Joint Resolution giving the consent of the exist¬ 
ing government to the annexation of Texas to the United States” approved on 
the third inst., I now have the honor to transmit you a copy of the said Joint 
Resolution properly authenticated at the State Department. 

Believing the Convention might have use for them, I also transmit you 
copies of the following official documents: 

1. A joint resolution for annexing Texas to the United States, aproved 
March ist, 1845. 

2. A Proclamation recommending the election of deputies to the Conven¬ 
tion. . . . 

3. A Proclamation declaring to the people of Texas the actual situation 
of affairs with Mexico, and a cessation of hostilities between the two 
countries. 

4. Conditions preliminary to a Treaty of Peace between Texas and 
Mexico. . . . 

5. Joint Resolution relative to the introduction of United States troops and 
for other purposes. 

On motion of A. S. Lipscomb, President Rusk, appointed a com¬ 
mittee, composed of the same members as that of the previous day, 
to draft an ordinance, “expressing the assent of the convention to the 
American proposition.” This committee, after an absence of a few 
minutes, reported the following ordinance, and recommended its 
adoption by the convention: 

Whereas the Congress of the United States of America has passed reso¬ 
lutions providing for the annexation of Texas to that Union, which resolutions 
were approved by the President of the United States on the first day of March, 
one thousand eight hundred and forty-five; and whereas the President of the 


LAST STAGE OF THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS 393 


United States has submitted to Texas the first and second sections of the said 
resolution, as the basis upon which Texas may be admitted as one of the States 
of the said Union; and whereas the existing government of the republic of 
Texas has assented to the proposals thus made, the terms and conditions of 
which are as follows: 

[The two first sections of the joint resolution of the Congress of the United 
States are here quoted.] 

Now, in order to manifest the assent of the people of this republic, as 
required in the above recited portions of the said resolutions, we, the deputies 
of the people of Texas, in convention assembled, in their name, and by their 
authority, do ordain and declare, that we assent to and accept the proposals, 
conditions, and guarantees contained in the first and second sections of the 
resolution of the Congress of the United States aforesaid. 

Despite his previous objections to the terms proposed by the 
United States, J. S. Mayfield, former Secretary of State, moved the 
adoption of the ordinance as submitted by the special committee. 
Thereupon, without any discussion, the vote was taken and there was 
but one dissenting voice, R. Bache of Galveston, and he affixed his 
signature to the resolution after it was adopted by the convention. 
President Rusk at once sent certified copies of the ordinance to Pres¬ 
ident Jones, to be by him transmitted to the President of the United 
States. On July 5, Donelson, who, as an interested observer, had 
been in attendance upon the Congress at Washington, arrived in Aus¬ 
tin, where Rusk immediately furnished him with a certified copy of \ 
the ordinance. This Donelson forwarded by a special messenger to 
Buchanan. 

In reply to President Rusk’s note accompanying the ordinance 
Donelson said: 

From the date of the acceptance of this Ordinance she [Texas] will have 
acquired the right to the protection of the United States, and the undersigned 
is happy to inform you that the President has already taken steps to afford 
this protection in the most effective manner against future invasion by either 
the Mexicans or Indians. 

[The convention proceeded to frame a State Constitution. Con¬ 
gress approved the constitution in December, 1845, and the change 
from republic to state was made on February 16, 1846.] 


CHAPTER XXX 


EAST TEXAS IN THE POLITICS OF THE REPUBLIC 

By George L. Crockett 

[This selection is from the Bulletin of the Sam Houston State Teachers 
College, March, 1928. The sectional rivalry between West Texas and East 
Texas is an interesting theme which needs to be developed by students of 
Texas history. This paper is a significant contribution to that topic. See 
Christian, “The Tariff History of the Republic of Texas,” in The South¬ 
western Historical Quarterly, XX, 315-340, XXI, 1-35. Read: Garrison, Texas, 
Chapter XIX; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 
143-168.] 

In order to understand the political alignment of the early states¬ 
men of East Texas and the reasons for their opinions, it is necessary 
to glance at the broader field of the Republic and the opinions of the 
different parties that arose therein. There were in fact no parties 
in the later sense of the word. There was no separation of public 
men and their followers into organized parties to which they owed 
allegiance; but there was a diversity in interests in the various sec¬ 
tions of the country, which led to differences of opinion between the 
people of the several sections, and in consequence caused their lead¬ 
ers to advocate different measures. These divergent opinions would, 
no doubt, have crystallized into party platforms had Texas continued 
much longer as an independent nation; as it was, they gave point and 
significance to the debates in congress, and to the political discussions 
in the home counties. 

In the division of interests the East was usually pitted against 
the West. Politically, East Texas included not only the original 
settlements of Nacogdoches and San Augustine, but the entire section 
east of the Trinity river, from Liberty at the south to Henderson 
and Crockett, and the settlements along the Red river in the north. 
The political opinion of the West centered in the counties lying on 
the Brazos and Colorado rivers, and as far as San Antonio. The 
Gulf coast, including Galveston, Houston and Matagorda, appears to 
have sided first with one section and then with the other, besides hav¬ 
ing problems of its own. 

This divergence of counsel did not arise originally in the Repub- 

394 


EAST TEXAS IN POLITICS OF THE REPUBLIC 395 


lie, but was an inheritance from the older colonies under the Mexi¬ 
can government. The centers of action in the colonial regime were 
Nacogdoches and San Augustine in the East, Liberty and Velasco in 
the South, and San Felipe, Bastrop and Gonzales in the West. The 
Eastern colonies were of different origin from those in the West and 
South, and were settled under different auspices. Their histories had 
developed along entirely different lines, and had but little in common. 
Their various problems were brought out in the conventions of 1832 
and 1833, and while the action of these bodies was harmonious in the 
interest of the whole province, it was inclusive of separate matters 
affecting the different sections. 

Of these political inheritances from the colonial period, some dis¬ 
appeared with the success of the revolution. One of these was the 
land problem along the eastern border, which was automatically set¬ 
tled by the inauguration of the land system of the Republic. Others, 
like the general policy for dealing with the Indian tribes, persisted, 
or even became intensified, after independence was established. Yet 
other matters, such as the question of annexation, the maintenance 
of the army and navy, and the imposition of the tariff, arose out 
of the establishment of Texas as a free nation. All these matters oc¬ 
cupied the attention of the general public, and in all there was a line 
of cleavage more or less distinctly marked between the East and West. 

Back of all these questions and dominating the situation was the 
personality of General Houston. Houston was the hero of East 
Texas. His first elevation to the command of the armies of the Re¬ 
public emanated from the Committee of Safety in San Augustine, 
and was immediately seconded at Nacogdoches. The people through¬ 
out that section had the greatest confidence in his military ability, and 
became his enthusiastic supporters after the final victory. On the 
other hand the people of the West and South, where the scourge of 
war had fallen most heavily, criticized him with great bitterness, 
which, as opportunity offered in his later years, developed into un¬ 
seemly vituperation. In the West his good actions were misunder¬ 
stood and condemned; in the East his worst faults were condoned 
or defended. Governor O. M. Roberts, in a lecture delivered at the 
University of Texas in May, 1895, says: “In fact in all that time 
(1836-1861) the political contention in Texas was for and against 
Houston, as much or more than the real public measures pertain¬ 
ing to the interests of the country, the West being generally op¬ 
posed to him and the East in his favor.” Nevertheless, the East, 
as Governor Roberts concedes, sometimes opposed his measures. 

In the East the chief towns were Nacogdoches and San Augustine, 
while the town of Clarksville in Red River county was growing in 
importance. Besides these were Shelbyville, Milam, Sabinetown, 
Bevilport and Jasper, and on the north the places of Palestine, 
Crockett, Henderson and Marshall. Among these the town of San 


396 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Augustine seemed at the time to have the greatest promise of future 
prosperity. This was due to a variety of causes which conspired to¬ 
gether to bring it into prominence. It was the gateway to Texas 
from the east, being the first important town on the only main road 
leading into the country from the United States. Located in the 
center of a beautiful hardwood forest country as contrasted with the 
pine hills above and below, it speedily attracted the immigrants, who 
settled there in large numbers. It soon outstripped its only eastern 
rival, Nacogdoches, which had not recovered at that time from the 
Mexican and Indian troubles of the previous decade, and became in 
fact one of the most important places in the Republic. It must be 
remembered that the West and South had been devastated by Santa 
Anna's invasion. Three of the principal towns, Gonzales, San Felipe, 
and Harrisburg had been burned to the ground; others had been 
ravaged and much property destroyed. Those which later rose to 
prominence, like Houston and Austin, were yet in their infancy, and 
could not be expected to wield much influence. San Augustine on 
the other hand, founded in 1833, and rapidly filling with inhabitants, 
had suffered less than any other town in Texas, and was in a position 
to attract an immigration, which soon made it populous for that time. 

Another cause which contributed to its prominence was the fact 
that a galaxy of brilliant men, leaders in thought and action, were 
attracted to the place and lived there during the time of the Republic, 
and some of them long afterwards. Many of the old leaders who 
had guided the affairs of the district through the troubles of the 
previous years had passed away. Jonas Harrison died in 1836. 
William McFarland moved to Newton county in 1837. Others had 
gone from the county in various directions. But their places had 
been taken by new men of as great or greater ability, who filled with 
distinction the highest offices of the Republic, and exercised a pro¬ 
found influence upon the fortunes of the nation. This group included, 
among others, James Pinckney Henderson, Kenneth L. Anderson, 
George W. Terrell, John A. Greer, Joseph Rowe, the brothers Rich¬ 
ardson and William R. Scurry, William B. Ochiltree, Dr. John S. 
Ford, B. Rush Wallace, Oran M. Roberts, Royall T. Wheeler, Henry 
W. Sublett, and Richard S. Walker; while the neighboring counties of 
Sabine, Shelby and Jasper furnished David S. Kaufman, William C. 
Crawford, and S. H. Everett. 

In Nacogdoches also we find the names of Thomas J. Rusk, 
Robert A. Irion, Charles S. Taylor, John Forbes, Kelsey A. Douglas, 
Amos Clark, William Clark, James H. Starr and Henry Raguet. 
Gravitating between Nacogdoches and San Augustine was the domi¬ 
nant figure in the Republic, Sam Houston. 

The power which these men wielded in the political life of the 
Republic is shown by the fact that they organized almost every Con¬ 
gress that was assembled during the decade of its existence. Joseph 


EAST TEXAS IN POLITICS OF THE REPUBLIC 397 


Rowe was chosen Speaker of the House in the second Congress, 
David S. Kaufman of the fourth and fifth, K. L. Anderson of the 
sixth, N. H. Darnell of the seventh, and Richardson Scurry of the 
eighth, making six out of ten speakers chosen. In the Senate, Stephen 
H. Everett of Jasper was chosen as President of that body for the 
second and third Congresses and John A. Greer of San Augustine 
for the sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth respectively. In addition to 
these it must be remembered that Houston, who was twice chosen 
President of the Republic, was an eastern man, while the election of 
Anson Jones, a southern man, turned upon his endorsement by the 
East. K. L. Anderson was elected Vice-President at the same time 
that Anson Jones was chosen President. Besides these J. Pinckney 
Henderson, Thomas J. Rusk, Robert A. Irion, James H. Starr, George 
W. Terrell, and William B. Ochiltree filled a number of important 
offices in the cabinet and diplomatic service. 

Another important element of influence was the Red Lander, 
published in San Augustine, which had a wide circulation in East 
Texas, and was well known throughout the Republic. The editor, 
Alanson W. Canfield, came to Texas in 1836. About 1840 he began 
publishing the Red Lander, and soon proved himself an efficient editor 
and manager. Governor Roberts in his lecture on San Augustine, 
says that he “generally enlisted some of the young attorneys to aid him 
in publishing it.” When we remember that these “young attorneys” 
were such men as Scurry, Anderson, Kaufman, Wheeler and Roberts 
himself, we can appreciate the quality of the aid thus rendered. To 
Canfield himself, however, must be given the credit for the editorial 
ability, keen sense and sound judgment which enabled him to produce 
a paper, the weight of whose opinions was felt and acknowledged 
everywhere in Texas. Its chief rivals in the political field were the 
Telegraph and Texas Register of Houston, edited by E. H. Cushing, and 
the Vindicator of Washington on the Brazos, which was usually re¬ 
garded as the semi-official organ of the government. Canfield met these 
papers on a fair field of political debate with no favors asked, and 
successfully upheld his end of the controversy. He published 
speeches made on various occasions by prominent men, letters and 
articles on leading questions of the day, state papers, such as the ad¬ 
dresses of the President and Vice-President, reports of political meet¬ 
ings and nominations of candidates, national (Texas) and foreign 
news (the foreign news sometimes in the form of rumors a month 
old), very little strictly local news, usually confined to deaths and 
marriages and matters in relation to the University and College. It 
was in short a weekly journal of national interest particularly de¬ 
voted to the affairs of East Texas. It contained as much matter of 
vital importance to Texas as an equal number of pages of any of the 
big dailies of the present time. It was used by men like General 
Henderson, Judge Ochiltree, Judge Scurry, Dr. John S. Ford and 


398 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


others as a proper medium to bring their opinions before the public, 
and the fact that it had the support of these men gave it additional 
weight in the country. 

As has been remarked the great issues upon which the people 
of Texas were divided were the Indian policy, the tariff and the 
question of annexation. Of these the first had been a troublesome 
problem from the very beginning. Indian relations were uppermost 
in men’s minds in the wars of 1827 and 1832, and occupied the 
thoughts of the delegates to the Conventions of 1832 and 1833. In 
the Consultation of 1835 it was recognized that the menace of Indian 
war formed one of the greatest perils, not only to the East but to all 
Texas. This is the explanation of the liberal promises made to the 
Cherokees by the Consultation in November, 1835, and of the treaty 
negotiated by Houston, Cameron, and Forbes in January, 1836. It 
was the fear of an Indian uprising that was the potent incentive to 
flight in the “runaway scrape” in April, 1836. Finally, as the result 
of Mexican intrigues, arose the trouble of 1838 and 1839, ending in 
the expulsion of the Cherokees. 

East Texas from the very beginning had manifested a pacific 
policy towards these Indians, and had suffered comparatively little 
from them. But it was all along evident that this pacifism was 
prompted by fear of their power rather than love of their cause. In 
this the Easterners failed to follow their hero, Houston, to the full 
extent of his policy. Houston was an adopted member of the Cher¬ 
okee Nation and had been invested with the dignity of a chief. No 
doubt he felt a genuine sympathy for them and a desire to treat them 
with the greatest liberality. In his first administration he endeavored 
to carry into effect the treaty he had made with them during the stress 
of war, and employed Colonel Alexander Horton, of San Augustine, 
to run the boundary line between the proposed Indian Reservation 
and the lands left open for settlement. It was hard to restrain the 
restless spirits of the pioneers from violating this agreement, and the 
continual infringements of the settlers upon the Indian land was a 
constant source of irritation. The cooler heads in East Texas did 
their best to restrict the settlers to the open lands, but when Houston 
passed out of office, and under Lamar the Cherokee war came on, 
the citizens sprang to arms with an alacrity which showed that their 
hearts were in the cause. 

The expulsion of the Cherokees was to them like the removal of 
an incubus from their shoulders. As they were able to breathe more 
easily they gave a more discriminating adherence to the pacific policy 
of Houston in his second administration. In the issue of July 8, 1843, 
Canfield in the Red Lander is of the opinion that white settlers tres¬ 
passing on Indian lands should be restrained and fully endorses the 
President’s policy. Judge G. W. Terrell, as Attorney General, par¬ 
ticipated in the negotiations of several Indian treaties signed during 


EAST TEXAS IN POLITICS OF THE REPUBLIC 399 

this administration. He also issued an official opinion upholding the 
validity of the Cherokee treaty of 1836, and declaring the titles to all 
lands located on the Cherokee tract to be void. The Red Lander, 
however, opposes this opinion on the ground that the Consultation 
had no authority to make such a treaty, and that it was later rejected 
by the Senate. It is noteworthy, however, that this adhesion to the 
liberal policy of Houston in relation to the Indians of the northern 
portion of the Republic came only after the dreaded menace of the 
Cherokee power had been removed. 

In the matter of annexation the sympathies of the citizens of this 
section were always with their kinsfolk in the United States. Gen¬ 
eral Henderson and General Rusk were ardent advocates of the 
measure, as were most of the public men of East Texas. General 
Houston as President of the Republic was of necessity more guarded 
in his utterances, and refused to place Texas in the attitude of a 
suppliant for admission, a position which was justified by the preva¬ 
lent opposition to annexation in the United States. An incident of 
the annexation campaign was a sort of long distance controversy be¬ 
tween San Augustine and Milford, Massachusetts, where a mass meet¬ 
ing had been held, and resolutions adopted condemning the annexa¬ 
tion of Texas. These were published in the Red Lander and pro¬ 
voked a spirited reply from Dr. John S. Ford. 

As this opposition continued to defeat every effort to unite the 
two nations under one government, the patience of the people began 
to be exhausted, and even the annexation party began to assume a 
more independent attitude. On July 8, 1843, the Red Lander said 
that at first the friends of the administration did not understand the 
President and hesitated to follow him, but now it was easy to under¬ 
stand. “Instead of selling the country to Great Britain or being 
bribed by Santa Anna—it would seem that he has been laboring for 
the good of the country.” 

Perhaps this feeling which was beginning to find a place in the 
breasts of our people was most aptly expressed by the Rev. Francis 
Wilson, a prominent Methodist preacher, and founder of the Wes¬ 
leyan College at San Augustine, in a lecture delivered in 1844 ' m Cin¬ 
cinnati and other Northern cities. He said: 

Brothers, we Texans reached over our hands and offered our lands and our 
country to you. We wanted our liberty tree to be one with yours, one govern¬ 
ment, one people, for we were anxious to be with you. You hesitate and 
parley till we may draw back from a brotherhood so unfeeling and dead to 
their interests; and we may form a connection that may make us troublesome 
neighbors, and we will say you alone drove us to these measures. You doubt 
our claim! Texas is ours by right of settlement, it is ours by occupancy and 
conquest, ours by the law of nations; nine years of independence have settled 
the matter for us. Texas could do better for herself than parley with Whigs 
and Democrats. She could defend herself against enemies, and she will do it. 
She could form treaties of commerce with nations who are able to help her, 


400 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


and she will do it. If our treaty is now rejected ... I shall take the field, 
and if I can wield any influence, I will advise Texas to build cities or states, 
call them after their own names, open a treaty on liberal terms with England, 
turn all our trade to her and she will bring this border war to an end, and 
our northern brethren will feel us many times, and we shall have a nation of 
millions of people, rich and happy through God who has fought our battles, 
and a clear conscience that we are right. 

The opposition in the United States was chiefly on the part of 
the Whigs, and many of those Whigs who had come to Texas, were 
influenced by the attitude of their fellow partisans in the States. Such 
was Judge Ochiltree, who was an active opponent of annexation to the 
last. Other old Whigs, like Colonel S. W. Blount, abandoned the 
party and aligned themselves with the Democrats. On the whole, 
however, the real feeling of the people may be illustrated in a letter 
from Shelbyville on November 26, 1844, and published in the Red 
Lander. It reads as follows: 

Mr. Canfield, Dear Sir:—If the signs of the times is any criterion to judge 
by, the popularity of Mr. Polk, Dallas and Annexation in this region round 
about here is unbounded. After the arrival of the Red Lander extra in town 
preparations were instantly made for the celebration of the evening. Directly 
after the approach of the evening shades all the old bells, horns, fiddles, tin 
pans, clevises and other musical instruments that could be paraded were in 
active motion by as many musicians. Shot guns, pistols and other things to 
make a noise were all set to work, until the deafening roar of fire arms, the 
ringing of bells, the beating of pans, the blowing of horns, and the occasional 
notes of the violin heard through the din of noise, made one believe that Ole 
Bull had visited the place, or that Beelzebub had appeared in our midst in the 
height of his prosperity, with his tail pointed and whiskers curled. 

The question which provoked the greatest amount of discussion 
was the tariff. Texas was almost compelled to levy a tariff for 
revenue, for the reason that it was impossible to raise enough funds 
to pay the current expenses of the government in any other way. Direct 
taxation was out of the question because there was not enough actual 
money in the country to pay the light taxes that were levied. But 
there were many serious objections to the tariff, the chief of which 
was the inequality with which it bore upon the different sections of 
the country. The western counties charged that they were compelled 
to pay duties upon all imported goods that they bought, while in the 
East customs duties were generally evaded by smuggling, but still 
advocated a tariff as the easiest and most just form of taxation, and 
called for an enforcement of the law in the East and the abolition of 
smuggling. The East tacitly admitted the existence of the smuggling, 
and constantly worked for a repeal of the tariff law so that equal 
taxes might be imposed upon all and their collection enforced, and 
to this end they favored free trade. 

In order to understand this situation it must be remembered that, 


EAST TEXAS IN POLITICS OF THE REPUBLIC 401 

while there was a custom house at every port of entry along the 
Gulf coast, there was only one on the long stretch of the eastern 
border from the Red River to the mouth of the Sabine. This was 
at San Augustine, with a clerk at Nacogdoches to take care of the 
business there. This left an extensive border unprotected and prac¬ 
tically open to the operations of smugglers, and meant that the other 
towns in East Texas could obtain goods from the United States duty 
free, while the merchants in San Augustine and Nacogdoches were 
compelled to pay the usual customs. 

The difference between the two sections is illustrated by the fact 
that during the lifetime of the Republic of Texas, the ports on the 
Gulf coast collected a revenue amounting to $781,572.77, while the 
revenue from the ports of the eastern border amounted to only $89,- 
580.20, a difference too great to be accounted for except by the free 
introduction of goods. The custom house at San Augustine, including 
the collection made at Nacogdoches, amounting to $62,105.90, a sum 
exceeded only by the ports of Galveston and Matagorda. As late 
as 1844 we find a protest signed by a number of the principal mer¬ 
chants in San Augustine and addressed to W. M. Hurt, customs 
collector, in which they set forth their grievances under the existing 
conditions and asked for a uniform enforcement of the law throughout 
the district. They declare that they do not object to the officer, or 
his acts, or to the payment of a tariff but they claim the right to 
protest against a law which is not and cannot be enforced, and whose 
partial enforcement injures only those who are loyal enough to pay. 

The remedy which East Texas sought in this situation was at first 
free trade, and then as the necessity for some form of tariff became 
evident, a moderate tariff was advocated. In this controversy San 
Augustine, from its peculiar situation, became the natural leader of 
the anti-tariff forces. Her representatives from the first were free 
traders, and any modification of their views arose from the evident 
necessity of raising a revenue. 

As early as the second Congress of the Republic Joseph Rowe of 
San Augustine proposed the abolition of the revenue district of Red 
River. On September 29, 1838, on motion of Kelsey H. Douglas, of 
Nacogdoches, a committee was appointed to draft a repeal of the 
tariff laws then in force. This effort to abolish the tariff was dropped 
later in the season, and a bill revising the law was introduced by a 
member from Bexar. In the third Congress we find the forces of 
the coast country added to those of the East in combating the tariff. 
Holmes of Matagorda introduced a bill to abolish or modify the 
present measures, and Kaufman of Sabine attempted to elude the pro¬ 
vision for modification leaving the question solely on the abolition of 
the law. 

The Telegraph and Texas Register was the chief advocate of 
free trade in the press at this time, and joined hands with the Eastern 


402 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


members in fighting for that measure. The Red Lander had not yet 
come into being. The main reason advanced for the justification of 
its position was that the law could not be enforced and therefore 
bore unequally on those who loyally obeyed it. 

Houston was relieved of the burden of the Chief Executive at 
the expiration of his first term as President, and was able to express 
himself more freely on all subjects, and now came out openly in 
favor of indirect taxation and a tariff measure. He was a member 
of Congress in the lower house from San Augustine and it is interest¬ 
ing to note that free trade measures were introduced during that time. 
In 1841 he was again President and in his annual message he explained 
his position as being in favor of a tariff system of indirect taxation, 
as against taxes levied directly by the government. His prestige was 
sufficient to carry the bill through to its final passage in January, 1842, 
but that it was not satisfactory to the people of the East was shown by 
the fact that John A. Greer, of San Augustine, was one of only two 
senators who voted against it, the other being Moore of Harris county. 

In the summer of 1842 in the congressional elections, practically 
every member chosen east of the Trinity river was in favor of free 
trade and the repeal of the tariff laws. The Red Lander was exultant 
over the success at the polls of its favorite measure. The bill for 
repeal, however, failed of final passage by a tie vote. 

By 1843 ^e East was beginning to be divided, and the Red Lander 
admitted the necessity of a tariff for revenue, but still contended for 
a change in the law which would make it more enforceable. Of the 
two representatives elected from San Augustine county, N. H. Dar¬ 
nell on December 18, 1843, introduced a bill in favor of a moderate 
tariff, while Richardson Scurry, who appears to have been an irrecon¬ 
cilable free trader, introduced one to repeal all tariff laws. Neither 
of these bills passed, but the committee to whom they were referred 
reported a substitute making a substantial reduction, which finally 
passed but was vetoed by President Houston. An attempt to pass 
the bill over the President’s veto carried overwhelmingly in the house 
but failed to receive a two-thirds majority necessary for its passage 
in the Senate. 

In 1844 the East was becoming more reconciled to the idea of 
a tariff, and in the election held in that summer the issue was pretty 
sharply drawn between free trade and a moderate tariff for revenue. 
The question was thoroughly debated, and the candidates stated their 
positions in their announcements. Henry W. Sublett of San Augus¬ 
tine in an extended announcement declared that he favored free trade, 
but was doubtful of its practical expediency at the time, hoping that 
the country would soon be in a position to adopt the measure. B. 
R. Wallace and John S. Ford advocated a moderate tariff and were 
elected. A similar result obtained throughout the East, and elsewhere 
in the Republic a majority of members was returned in favor of a 


EAST TEXAS IN POLITICS OF THE REPUBLIC 403 


revision of the tariff making the rates lower. A bill was presented in 
the House reducing the rates appreciably and carried by a large 
majority, and after some modification was carried unanimously in the 
Senate. It was, however, vetoed by President Anson Jones on the 
ground that it made no provision for the expenses of the government. 
The vote of the Eastern members with three exceptions was in favor 
of the reduction. 

Thus it will be seen that East Texas was the original home of the 
free trade doctrine in the Republic, and held consistently to that view 
until it became evident that some customs duties were necessary for 
the ordinary expenses of the government. They then opposed a high 
tariff, and with such success that on two occasions bills were passed 
reducing the existing tariff and only failed to become a law by the 
interposition of the executive veto. The opposition to free trade in 
the East appears to have been mainly in Red River and adjoining 
counties in the north where the doctrine of a moderate tariff pre¬ 
vailed. In this position the leaders of political thought in East Texas 
were more or less at variance with General Houston, who all along 
advocated a tariff high enough to provide ample revenues for the 
support of the government. 

In this connection it may not be amiss to glance at the political 
machinery of that day. There were, of course, no primary elections, 
neither were there any general nominating conventions at which issues 
might be discussed and leaders chosen to represent them before the 
voters. The procedure may be illustrated by the case of General Rusk 
in 1843. General Rusk had never entered the political arena as a 
candidate for office. He held the position of Chief Jutsice of the 
Republic from February, 1839, till June, 1840, at which time he re¬ 
signed, having held but one court. Thereafter he devoted his time 
to the practice of his profession in partnership with J. P. Henderson 
and K. L. Anderson. In the Red Lander of April 15, 1843, we read 
that “a large respectable meeting of the citizens of San Augustine 
and vicinity” was held in the court house at San Augustine. B. R. 
Wallace explained the purpose of the meeting: Richardson Scurry 
was elected chairman and J. B. Johnson secretary. General Thomas 
J. Rusk was then unanimously proposed as candidate for the presi¬ 
dency of the Republic, and a committee of fifty men was appointed 
to prepare resolutions and notify General Rusk of his nomination. A 
little later Shelby county followed with a similar action. About the 
middle of May a meeting was held at Nacogdoches for the same pur¬ 
pose. In the first part of July General Rusk issued a letter declining 
the nomination. In the same paper we find Abner S. Lipscomb an¬ 
nounced as candidate, followed in a few weeks by the nomination of 
Anson Jones, in a public meeting in San Augustine. Jones was elected 
in August, and at the same time Kenneth L. Anderson was elected 
Vice-President. The adherence of East Texas to his support, together 


404 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


with the candidacy of one of its own men as his running mate would 
seem to have been the deciding factor in the election of the ticket. 

The same course seems to have been followed in the case of 
county and district officers both civil and military, and when a man 
ran for office he literally “put himself in the hands of his friends ,, 
or in some instances his friends took charge of him without permis¬ 
sion. When he was willing to run, the candidate modestly announced 
that he “yielded to the solicitations of his friends.” Otherwise he 
declined, having, perhaps, some better thing in view. In cases, how¬ 
ever, where he did not find himself sufficiently urged the candidate 
would boldly announce his name as an aspirant for office, and seek 
the support of the populace. 


CHAPTER XXXI 


THE SETTLEMENT OF THE PUBLIC DEBT OF THE 

REPUBLIC 

By E. W. Winkler 

[This brief selection from Johnson, Texas and Texans, I, 500-503, describes 
the settlement of the debt of the Republic. E. T. Miller, A Financial History 
of Texas (University of Texas Bulletin), 18-82, gives the financial history of 
the Republic in great detail. Read: Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School 
History of Texas, 157-169.] 

At the time of annexation Texas owed between eight and ten 
millions of dollars. The interest on this debt had never been paid, 
hence it was growing rapidly. The only resource Texas had with 
which to pay the debt was the public lands, which, by the terms of 
annexation, were dedicated to this purpose. 

At the session of the first legislature a committee was appointed 
to consider ways and means for paying the debt. In its report, dated 
March 1, 1846, it said: 

Your committee are confident the people of Texas feel keenly the weight 
of this obligation, and are anxious to meet it. . . . Unfortunately, however, 
for Texas . . . her population has not increased with the rapidity which might 
have been anticipated from the salubrity of her climate and the fertility of 
her soil. Her resources and ability for raising revenue from direct taxation 
cannot, for many years to come, exceed the urgent and indispensable wants 
of her domestic administration. Nor can it be denied that annexation, how¬ 
ever important and advantageous to the country in other respects, has, by 
destroying the revenue arising from the customs, taken from us a growing 
source of revenue, which might in a short time have afforded efficient means 
of providing for the public creditors. However strong, therefore, may be the 
desire of the country to provide for its creditors, it has no ability of doing 
so except through the means of public lands. 

Sale of the public lands to the United States was recommended, 
but the United States probably did not care to buy. 

The committee commented on the character of the debt; they said: 
“The fact that the debt was contracted during a revolutionary struggle 
constitutes no reason . . . why we should not pay it in honesty and 
good faith. They, nevertheless, think that she should be bound to 
return to the public creditors only what, according to just average, 
they paid her for her securities, with the rate of interest stipulated in 

405 


406 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

the bond or other evidence of debt.” Here is a suggestion for reducing 
or scaling the debt, which evoked protests from the creditors and of 
which we shall hear more in tracing this subject. _ . 

An act was approved March 20, 1848, “to provide for ascertaining 
the debt of the late republic of Texas.” The holders of claims were 
required to lay them before the comptroller and auditor, and those 
officials were directed to classify them and reduce them to the actual 
par value which the republic realized. By another act it was provided 
that the creditors might exchange their claims, as determined by the 
auditorial board, for land certificates at the rate of fifty cents an acre. 
Land certificates, however, were at that date selling for much less than 
fifty cents per acre, consequently very few creditors settled their claims 
on this basis. 

In the meantime the subject of the Texas-New Mexico boundary 
had come to the front in Congress, and through the skillful manage¬ 
ment of the Texas creditors the settlement of the public debt became 
inseparably connected with it. Texas had twice pledged herself to 
care for her public debt. At this time she was not trying to evade 
her obligations, but she insisted on having her own way in settling 
her own business. However, for a portion of the Texan liabilities the 
income from import duties had been specifically pledged. Through 
annexation these duties inured to the exclusive benefit of the United 
States. Certain members of Congress argued that a transfer of the 
security carried with it responsibility for the debt. This view was 
acquiesced in by a sufficient number in Congress to cause to be in¬ 
serted in the boundary act a provision that five millions of the bonds, 
issued to Texas in consideration of the loss of land suffered in adjust¬ 
ing the boundary, should be retained in the United States treasury in 
order that the United States might be enabled to take receipts from 
the creditors whose claims were secured by a pledge of the customs 
duties and thus protect herself for the future. Of course, the bonds 
were Texan property, and could be paid out only on orders from the 
Texan government. The state agreed to this arrangement, although 
the guardianship assumed by the United States was extremely dis¬ 
tasteful to many. 

The fact that Texas was thus quite unexpectedly placed in posses¬ 
sion of means apparently ample to satisfy all her creditors caused 
great activity among the latter. The protests against the scaling of 
their claims became voluminous. On the other hand, Texas expe¬ 
rienced all the sensations resulting from suddenly acquired wealth, and, 
no doubt, many citizens occupied much time in planning ways of spend¬ 
ing it in the upbuilding and enrichment of the state. 

A second five millions in United States bonds were turned over to 
Texas early in 1852. Promptly an act was passed, January 31, 1852, 
“providing for the liquidation and payment of the debt of the late 
republic of Texas. ,, This act appropriated two millions of dollars 


THE SETTLEMENT OF THE PUBLIC DEBT 407 


of the bonds in the state treasury for the payment of that portion of 
the public debt, as reported by the auditorial board, and accrued in¬ 
terest thereon, which was not secured by the revenues from import 
duties. The act further appropriated the five millions of dollars in 
bonds retained in the United States treasury to pay that portion of 
the public debt, as reported by the auditorial board, and accrued in¬ 
terest thereon, which was secured by the revenues from import duties. 
The payment of these last mentioned claims, however, was to be 
suspended until such time as the United States shall have turned over 
to Texas the whole of the five millions of dollars in bonds retained, 
in exchange for releases from the creditors, or portions of said bonds 
equal to the sums for which the state may present the required re¬ 
leases from any portion of the creditors. Under this act the domestic 
debt was promptly paid, but for reasons stated in the next paragraph 
the revenue debt remained unpaid for more than four years. 

The secretary of the treasury of the United States interpreted 
the boundary act as specifying that all the creditors of Texas, whose 
claims were secured by the revenue, must file their releases before 
any portion of the bonds retained could be issued to Texas. In addi¬ 
tion to this, the secretary of the treasury construed the laws of Texas 
relating to the public debt in such a way as to extend the security 
of customs duties to a much larger quantity of liabilities than the 
officers of Texas had ever considered as coming within such guar¬ 
antee. These constructions of the secretary of the treasury made it 
impossible to meet the conditions prescribed in the boundary act. 

There were over 1,600 creditors from whom releases were to be 
obtained. Some filed their releases promptly, but others refused to do 
so because Texas had scaled their claims. Their action delayed the 
payment of all. Since it was the act of the United States that kept 
the creditors from receiving their money, they petitioned Congress 
to amend the conditions of the boundary act so as to permit the pay¬ 
ment of those claims for which the corresponding releases had been 
signed. Howeyer, those members of Congress who emphasized the 
responsibility of the United States for the payment of the revenue 
debt of Texas opposed such an amendment because it implied ac¬ 
quiescence by the United States in the scaling that Texas had done. 
But, in view of the construction placed upon the laws of Texas relating 
to the public debt by the secretary of the treasury, the five millions of 
dollars in bonds retained in the treasury were by no means sufficient 
to pay the secured claims at their face value. The matter having been 
complicated in this manner, the subject was permitted to drag through 
several sessions of Congress to the great injury of those creditors 
who were willing to settle for their claims. The revenue debt was finally 
disposed of by an act of Congress approved February 28,1855. This act 
appropriated in lieu of the five millions in bonds, retained in the 
United States treasury, the sum of $7,750,000 cash, to be apportioned 


408 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


among the creditors pro rata. Before this could go into effect the 
legislature of Texas was required to give its assent to the act, and 
to “abandon all claims and demands against the United States, grow¬ 
ing out of Indian depredations or otherwise.” The five millions in 
bonds, principal and interest, were estimated to amount to $6,500,000. 
The additional $1,250,000 was allowed to set off a claim of $3,800,000 
preferred by Texas against the United States for depredations com¬ 
mitted by United States Indians in Texas since. 1836. 

Governor Pease submitted the act of Congress to the voters of 
Texas for approval or rejection, as Governor Bell had done in the 
case of the boundary act. “There was powerful opposition to its 
acceptance, led by some of the ablest men in the state.” However, 
only 25,427 of the 45,000 who participated in the election expressed 
themselves in regard to this act; 13,818 voted to reject. The governor 
did not consider this vote a fair test of public opinion, and, therefore, 
urged the legislature to give its assent to the same. The friends 
and opponents of this measure were so equally divided that the result 
remained long in doubt,” but it was finally carried, the votes in both 
the house and the senate being very close. The act received the 
governor’s approval February 1, 1856. The principal objection to 
the act seems to have been the condition requiring that the creditors 
of Texas be paid at the United States treasury. The scaling that 
Texas had done, while not adopted in toto, was followed in principle, 
for the amount appropriated, $7,750,000, had to satisfy claims aggre¬ 
gating the sum of $10,078,703.21. The pro rata was nearly 76 % 0 
cents on the dollar. The comptroller of Texas was sent to Washing¬ 
ton to inspect and verify all claims presented for payment in order 
to protect the state against frauds. 

Thus, in the manner described, Texas discharged her debt without 
resort to taxation. After paying the debt, a considerable surplus re¬ 
mained in the state treasury, and was subsequently spent for public 
improvements. 


CHAPTER XXXII 


THE FINANCES OF TEXAS, 1846-1861 

By Edmund Thornton Miller 

[From Professor E. T. Miller, A Financial History of Texas, 83-93, 133, 
University of Texas Bulletin, July, 1916. This selection continues the pre¬ 
ceding one by Mr. Winkler describing the settlement of the debt of the Re¬ 
public. Portions of Professor Miller’s treatment here omitted discuss special 
funds and the various sources of the state’s revenues.] 


The State, 1846-1861 

In the general election held in September, 1836, to ratify the 
constitution of the republic and to elect the national officers, the 
voters of Texas declared themselves almost unanimously in favor of 
annexation to the United States. Owing mainly to the slavery ques¬ 
tion, however, the desire of Texas was not at this time reciprocated. 
In 1843 overtures were again made and a treaty of annexation was 
signed, but was rejected by the United States Senate in June, 1844. 
The expedient of a joint resolution was then adopted by the friends 
of Texas in Congress, and on March 1, 1845, the United States pro¬ 
posed annexation. President Jones of the republic called a conven¬ 
tion, which on July 4, 1845, passed an ordinance accepting the pro¬ 
posal of the United States, and this ordinance and the constitution 
for the new state which had been framed by the convention were rati¬ 
fied by a popular vote on October 13, 1845. Annexation was 
consummated by the joint resolution of the United States, December 
29, 1845; and on February 19, 1846, President Jones turned over the 
government of the republic to the officers of the new state. The first 
chapter of the state’s financial history ended in 1861, when secession 
took place and a war was entered upon which prostrated the finances 
of the state and the general economic life of the state for many years 
to follow. 

Texas shared with the rest of the United States the great pros¬ 
perity and material development which characterized the years 
1846 to 1857. About the time of annexation, population numbered 
roughly 135,000; in 1850 it had increased to 212,592, and in i860 it 
was 604,215. In 1850 the per cent of the total population that was 
negro was 27.54; in i860 it was 30.1. The white population of the 

409 


410 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


state increased 173.24 per cent in the decade 1850-1860; the rate of 
increase of the slave population was 213.89 per cent; while the total 
population increased 184.2 per cent. Thus, while the population of 
the state grew prodigiously between 1850 and i860, the large negro 
element minimized the value of the growth. 

The population of the state was almost wholly rural. Galveston 
was the leading town in 1850 with a population of 4,177; San An¬ 
tonio was next with 3,488; Houston was third with 2,396; New 
Braunfels was fourth with 1,298, and Marshall was fifth with 1,189. 
The total number of people in the twenty-three Texas towns listed 
in the United States Census of 1850 was only 20,209. Only five of 
the twenty-three towns had over one thousand inhabitants. Count¬ 
ing as urban the population of all the towns, the per cent of the 
population of the state that was urban was 9.5. The population was 
spread very thinly over the state, there being on the average in 1850 
only eight-tenths of a person to the square mile. By i860 the average 
density of population was 2.3 persons to the square mile. There was 
practically no increase in the urban proportion of the population be¬ 
tween 1850 and i860. In i860 San Antonio was the leading city with 
8,235 inhabitants; Galveston was next with 7,307; Houston was third 
with 4,845; and Austin was fourth, with 3,494. The United States 
Census of i860 lists forty-two cities and towns with a total population 
of 59,651. Their population was 9.8 per cent of the total population. 

Population continued to follow rather closely the navigable water¬ 
ways, but transportation was nevertheless largely by means of the ox 
wagon. Railroad building began before the middle of the fifties, but 
the towns affected by it were comparatively few and were on or near 
the coast. The number of miles of railroad in operation was 32 in 
1854, 40 in 1855, 71 in 1856, 157 in 1857, 205.5 in 1858, 284.5 in 
1859, ' an d 306 in i860. The estimated cost of construction of the 306 
miles was $11,232,345. 

Agriculture was practically the sole occupation of the people as 
was shown by the large per cent of the population that was rural. 
In 1850 the number of acres of improved land in farms was 643,976, 
and the number of acres of unimproved land in farms was 10,852,363. 
In i860 the respective amounts were 2,650,781 and 22,693,247. 
Though agriculture was almost the sole occupation of the people of 
the state, the farm area was only 6.8 per cent of the total land area 
in 1850 and 15.1 per cent in i860. The balance of the land area was 
unoccupied and uncultivated, but it was owned either by the state or 
by land speculators. The cash value of the farms in 1850 was $16,- 
550,008, and in i860, $88,101,320. The value of farming implements 
was $2,151,704 in 1850, and $6,259,452 in i860. The value of live¬ 
stock was $10,412,927 in 1850, and $42,825,447 in i860. Cotton was 
the principal crop, and corn was the second crop in importance. There 
were 58,072 bales of cotton of 400 pounds each produced in 1849, and 


THE FINANCES OF TEXAS, 1846-1861 


411 


431,463 bales in 1859. The average price per pound for upland cot¬ 
ton was 12.3 cents in 1849, an d n cents in 1859. 

Manufactures were either brought in from outside of the state 
or were made in the home, though there were some local manufactur¬ 
ing establishments. In 1850 there were 309 manufacturing establish¬ 
ments, including shops doing custom’s work and repairing, with a total 
annual product valued at only $1,168,538. In i860 there were 983 
establishments, whose annual product was valued at only $6,577,202. 
The value of home manufactured products was $266,984 in 1850, and 
$584,217 in i860. 

Though diversification of industry was yet to come and though 
most people depended on the ox wagon, population was increasing 
rapidly, agriculture was flourishing and the state as a whole was 
prospering. 

The finances of this period will be treated under the topics, Ex¬ 
penditures, School Funds, Receipts, and Public Debt. 

Expenditures 

The history of expenditures to 1861 may be divided into the two 
periods, 1846-1851 and 1852-1860. Down to 1852 the policy of 
economy followed during the last years of the republic was continued. 
Annexation relieved the state of the duties having to do with foreign 
intercourse, an army, a navy, and a post service, and until 1852 no 
new duties were undertaken, nor was the scale of performance of the 
old ones enlarged. The largest items of expense down to 1852 were 
the judiciary, the legislature, and the administration of the general 
land office. Together they made up about 60 per cent of the total 
expenditures. The judiciary had been scantily paid during the re¬ 
public, but after 1845 salaries were increased. Frequent sessions of 
the legislature were called for in order to enact the statute laws for 
the newly organized state, but until 1850 there were only three ses¬ 
sions of about three months each. In 1850 the question arose as 
to the settlement of the northwest boundary dispute with the United 
States, and thereafter special sessions multiplied. Though they were 
of brief duration, the mileage expense was a large item. Legislative 
expenditures constituted about 12 per cent of the total expenditures 
of the period. The general land office was the most costly of the de¬ 
partments of general administration, and receipts from lands did not 
counter-balance the expenditures. 

Until 1852 the state was dependent on taxation for revenue, but 
in 1851 there came a windfall in the form of the five million dollars 
of United States bonds which were a part of the payment by the 
United States for the cession of the northwest territory and for the 
relinquishment by Texas of certain claims against the United States. 
The first claim upon these bonds was regarded to be that part of the 


412 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


debt of the Republic of Texas which was not subject to payment out 
of the United States Treasury. Payment of this debt was begun in 
1852 and continued throughout the period. It constituted by far the 
largest item of expenditure, being about 23 per cent of the total. 

The use to which the remainder of the bonds should be put vexed 
the public mind and was a good test of the sanity of the early Texans. 
There was more than four million dollars available. Some advocated 
its use for internal improvements, others for education, while others 
believed it should be kept as a fund, the interest from which would 
be sufficient to meet the ordinary expenses of the state and thus relieve 
the people from taxation. $2,000,000 of the bonds was given to the 
general school fund, $100,000 to the university fund, and the re¬ 
mainder was used to meet the current expenditures of the state. The 
taxes that would have been collected for the state purposes were 
relinquished from 1852 to 1858 to the counties and used by them to 
pay their debts, to build courthouses and jails, and to meet county 
expenses for other objects. The relinquishment did not benefit equally 
all the counties, but, in general, the end sought was attained, and as 
late as 1879 the bonded debt of Texas counties was only $2,030,907. 
But the use of the bonds in paying the ordinary expenses of the state 
government—which was necessitated by this relinquishment policy— 
was very poor financiering, and there is little doubt but that the benefit 
to the state would have been greater if the bonds had been used to 
endow further the school and university funds. On August 31, i860, 
there was to the credit of the general revenue account only $50,000 
of the bonds, and these were a part of the $100,000 borrowed from the 
university fund. Thus by 1861 not only had all the bonds not reserved 
for the two trust funds been expended, but those even in one of the 
trust funds had been borrowed. This occurred during a period when 
the population and wealth of the state were growing rapidly. Ex¬ 
penditures, while liberal, were not extravagant, and the explanation 
of the plight of the bonds lies rather in the revenue policy followed. 
After 1853 the salaries of those in the service of the state were in¬ 
creased, but $3,000 for the governor and the supreme court judges, 
$2,250 for district judges, $1,800 to $2,000 for heads of departments, 
and $900 to $1,200 for clerks were not unreasonable compensations. 

An item of extraordinary expense which became important in 
1852 and remained so thereafter was frontier defense. The Indians 
had been comparatively quiet up to that time, but as they were then 
being pushed farther and farther west, the outposts of the white settle¬ 
ments experienced their resentment. The state maintained mounted 
troops on the frontier at a heavy expense in order to protect the 
settlements. The expenditures for this purpose during the four years 
1852-1855 amounted to about $95,000, and the claim against the United 
States for this amount was relinquished in accordance with the act 
of Congress of February 28, 1855. From 1856 to 1861 over $375,000 


THE FINANCES OF TEXAS, 1846-1861 


413 


was expended for this purpose, and it was on this account that the 
$100,000 of United States bonds belonging to the university fund was 
borrowed in i860. The seriousness of this expense as a drain upon 
the treasury may be best understood by the fact that it constituted in 
i860 more than 24 per cent of the expenditures. The Indians were 
the charges of the United States and that government was financially 
responsible for them, but Texas was not reimbursed for her expendi¬ 
tures for frontier defense until 1906. 

The state penitentiary was the object of increased appropriations 
from 1852 to 1858. It was enlarged, and as an adjunct to it a factory 
for the manufacture of cotton and woolen goods was built and 
equipped in 1854. The policy of leasing the convicts in order to re¬ 
duce their expense to the state was also considered, but was not 
adopted. The net expense of the institution decreased after the fac¬ 
tory got into operation, and during the Civil War the factory was a 
most important auxiliary of the government. 

Until 1856 the state made no provision for the insane, the blind, 
or the deaf and dumb, but in that year buildings and maintenance 
were authorized for each of these, and each of the institutions was 
endowed with 100,000 acres of land. 

Expenditures for public buildings increased after 1852. A new 
capitol, governor’s mansion, land office building and treasury building 
were erected. They were modest buildings, for the cost of construct¬ 
ing and furnishing all of them did not exceed $270,000. 

Expenditures of minor importance were for pensions and for what 
may be called industrial purposes. No general pension law was 
enacted, but cases of soldiers and seamen disabled in the Texas revolu¬ 
tion or in the service of the Republic of Texas were dealt with in¬ 
dividually. Industrial expenditures were for the taking of the state 
census, and in 1858 for a geological and agricultural survey of the 
state. Public printing increased in cost after 1851, mainly because 
of the increased volume of printing. 

Expenditures so far considered related to state duties of unques¬ 
tioned legitimacy. The policy that should be followed in regard to 
internal improvements, however, was the subject of a vigorous con¬ 
troversy. During the republic four railroads were chartered, but the 
aid granted to them was only their right of way over the public 
domain, and not one was built. It was not unusual to find in state 
constitutions which were drawn up at about the time Texas adopted 
hers a provision that enjoined encouragement to internal improve¬ 
ments. A similar injunction was lacking in the Texas Constitution 
of 1845, an d the only provisions relating to the subject were that no 
appropriation should be made for internal improvements without the 
concurrence of two-thirds of both houses of the legislature, and that 
the state should not be part owner of the stock or property belonging 
to any corporation. During the first years of statehood railroad 


414 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


companies were chartered, but no construction took place, and the 
charters were forfeited. No subsidies were given, foreign capital was 
timid, domestic capital was both scarce and otherwise more profitably 
employed, population was sparse, the traffic in sight small, and dis¬ 
tances to be covered were great. The failure of unaided private enter¬ 
prise down to 1852 to provide means of transportation forced the ques¬ 
tion of state assistance to the forefront of public questions. 

The method of state assistance first adopted was the donation 
in several special chartering acts of eight sections of land for each 
completed mile of road. Previously, in 1850, statutory permission 
was given the cities and counties along the route of the proposed 
San Antonio Railroad to subscribe to its capital stock. The city 
of San Antonio and Bexar County each subscribed $100,000, and 
these were the only municipal subsidies given in Texas before the 
Civil War. 

The imagination of the public was kindled by the receipt by the 
state of the $5,000,000 of United States bonds; and in 1852 public 
meetings and conventions began to be held to discuss the subject of 
internal improvement. During the years from 1852 to 1856, which 
was a period of discussion, three plans for securing a system of im¬ 
provements were presented. One was called the “State Plan, ,, and 
was championed by Governor Pease. It comprehended a system of 
railroads, canals and river improvements. The railroads were to be 
built and owned by the state, but leased for private operation. The 
funds for construction were to be raised through the sale of state bonds, 
and the interest on the bonds was to be met by a direct tax, until an 
amount sufficient to meet the interest should be realized from the sale 
of the public lands or from the profits on the constructed works. 
The advocates of this plan thought that by it the state would secure 
during the next fifteen years internal improvements valued at from 
twenty-five to thirty million dollars. “No argument against the prac¬ 
ticability of the plan here presented,” said the governor, “can be 
drawn from the experience of other states, which have attempted a 
system of improvements, because none of them have attempted a 
system like this.” 

Another plan was called the “Iron Policy.” It was so called be¬ 
cause it proposed the investment of the school fund in railroad iron 
which was to be loaned to the roads. Governor Pease regarded this 
plan as the alternative to the “State Plan.” The third plan was 
called the “Loaning System,” and was the plan to invest the school 
fund in the bonds of railroad companies. The “Loaning System” 
was approved by the convention called to consider internal improve¬ 
ments which met in Austin, July 4, 1856, and in which twenty-six 
counties were represented. 

It was pointed out that the experience of other states with internal 
improvements had been “enormous expenditures on unprofitable 


THE FINANCES OF TEXAS, 1846-1861 


415 


works, State debts, repudiation, and finally ruinous taxation.” This 
experience was heeded, and the “State Plan” and the “Iron Policy” 
were rejected. The policy adopted was, first, to donate to each rail¬ 
road sixteen alternate sections of land for every mile of completed 
road, the land to be surveyed in sections of 640 acres at the expense 
of the road; second, to loan for ten years at six per cent interest 
the United States bonds belonging to the school fund to railroad com¬ 
panies chartered by the state, at the rate of $6,000 for each mile con¬ 
structed, the loan to be secured by a first lien upon the property of a 
road; third, to appropriate $300,000 out of the state treasury for 
the improvement of the navigable rivers, bayous, lakes, and bays of 
the state, and for the construction of canals. The act carrying this 
appropriation imposed the important conditions that the maximum 
amount to be given to any one river project should be $50,000, and 
that no aid should be given unless there was raised by private sub¬ 
scriptions a sum equal to one-fifth of the amount asked of the state. 
Some eighteen contracts were entered into, and by the end of the 
fiscal year 1863 the appropriation of $300,000 was exhausted. It 
is difficult to believe that the amounts expended accomplished any¬ 
thing. Texas rivers apparently were no more permanently navigable 
before the Civil War than they are today, for it was proposed in 
1856 that $100,000 should be expended on digging a number of artesian 
wells at the heads of all Texas rivers in order that they might be 
supplied with water. Any improvements in the rivers which may 
have been effected as a result of this state assistance was suffered to 
be lost during the years of the war and the Reconstruction. 

Expenditures of a character different from the above were those 
for education and the public debt, and these will be treated in con¬ 
nection with the school funds and the public debt. 

Summary 

The first period of statehood began and ended with the general 
treasury in financial difficulties, and but for the opportune receipt of 
the $5,000,000 of United States bonds and the assumption of the 
payment of the revenue debt of the republic by the United States 
the treasury would probably have been in dire straits throughout the 
entire period. As it was, however, the receipt of the bonds enabled 
the state during eight years out of the fourteen of the period to pay 
a large and harassing debt, to endow the school fund generously, to 
construct public buildings, to meet the ordinary expenses of the gov¬ 
ernment, to aid in the construction of railroads, and to administer the 
vast public domain not with a view to revenue but so as to encourage 
the growth of population and the material development of the state. 
The indemnity bonds were the key to the expenditure and revenue 
policies of the period, and their influence was felt in later periods. 


416 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Inasmuch as the general treasury was greatly assisted prior to the 
receipt of the bonds by the revenue accruing under the laws of the 
Republic of Texas, the state government was supported throughout 
the first period of statehood not from taxation but from extraneous 
sources—from windfalls. The result was that the people of the state 
did not become accustomed to taxation as a method of supporting 
the government, and a habit of depending upon other sources was 
thereby fostered. The beginnings of this habit had really been made 
during the period of the republic, because the republic lived on credit. 

The purely agricultural character of the population and the frontier 
condition existing throughout the state were reflected not only in the 
general attitude towards education but also in the expenditure, rev¬ 
enue and debt policies. There was a tendency to confine expendi¬ 
tures to the support of the narrow protective functions of government; 
poll and occupation taxes which would fall on those engaged in 
business were popular, and the scaling of the debt was a widely ap¬ 
proved policy. 


CHAPTER XXXIII 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION, 
1832-1863 

By Abigail Curlee 

[This selection is a history of the operation of a small plantation, Peach 
Point, a few miles above the mouth of the Brazos River. The plantation was 
owned by James F. Perry, the second husband of Stephen F. Austin’s sister. 
The Perrys arrived in Texas in 1831. The Peach Point plantation was opened 
in 1832. It was James F. Perry’s home until his death in 1853, and is still 
owned by his descendants. 

This article is written mainly from the Plantation Record Book and the 
Plantation Day Book. These books were given to the University of Texas by 
Mrs. James F. Perry and her son and daughter-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. Stephen 
S. Perry, of Freeport, Texas. The article is the most complete history available 
of a Texas slave plantation. It is published in full in The Southwestern His¬ 
torical Quarterly, XXVI, 79-127.] 

I. General Description of Agriculture in Texas, 1831-36 

When Perry came to Texas, the country was sparsely settled from 
Bexar to the Sabine River. West of Bexar and extending to the 
Rio Grande, the country was unsettled. He found agricultural 
methods crude and good implements scarce. The people were, as 
a rule, living in log houses and cultivating the river bottom land. 
The bottom lands had to be cleared of timber or of cane. Mrs. 
Holley said that this cane land was prized, because it was rich alluvial 
soil. The cane-brakes could be cleared by burning the dead reeds. 
If the cane land was not cultivated, the cane was valuable as food 
for cattle and horses in winter, being young and tender when the grass 
was dead. The prairie lands were generally considered more suitable 
for grazing than farming. As late as 1850, it was the belief that the 
timbered portions of Texas were best adapted to agriculture. The 
vast prairies were regarded as valueless except for grazing and stock 
raising. Also it was an axiom that farming could not succeed west 
of the Brazos. Abundant pasturage was afforded on the thin and 
sandy coast land for stock of all varieties. 

In 1834 the country was divided into the three political depart¬ 
ments of Bexar, Brazos, and Nacogdoches. The Bexar Department 
was largely peopled by Mexicans. Almonte says there were no negro 
laborers here. All the provisions raised by the inhabitants were con¬ 
sumed in the district. The wild horse when caught was cheap. Cattle 

417 


418 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


were cheap, a cow and calf being considered equal to ten dollars. 
This was the condition all over the colony. Mrs. Harris said that 
there was little money in Texas. Her father received cattle and 
hogs in lieu of money for his practice as a physician, a cow and a 
calf passing as ten dollars. In the Bexar region there were only 
five thousand or so head of sheep. They exported from eight to 
ten thousand skins of various kinds, and imported a few articles from 
New Orleans. 

The Department of the Brazos was the section that Perry was 
interested in, for it was here that Austin’s Colony was located. San 
Felipe, Columbia, Matagorda, Gonzales, and Mina were the five 
municipalities of this department and in addition there were consid¬ 
erable towns at Brazoria, Harrisburg, Velasco, and Bolivar. Almonte 
estimated the population of the department at eight thousand, of 
which he thought one thousand were slaves. 

Almonte said that around 2,000 bales of cotton had been exported 
from the Brazos in 1833, 1 while Austin, who left Texas for the 
City of Mexico in April of 1833, had estimated that the crop for that 
year would be 7,500 bales. But there had been a big overflow in 
1833, which had cut down the crop after Austin’s estimate was made. 
Almonte said that five thousand bales had been exported in 1832. 
The maize crop in 1833 was over fifty thousand barrels, but none 
was exported. The cattle of the department Almonte set down at 
about twenty-five thousand head. The market cattle were driven to 
Natchitoches for sale. The cotton of the Brazos was exported to 
New Orleans and returned from 10 to lO'jA cents per pound after 
paying 2^2 per cent duty in New Orleans. No sheep were raised here, 
but there were probably 50,000 hogs in the district. 

Almonte calculated that the trade of the department had reached 
$600,000 based on the production of 1832. The 5,000 bales of cotton 
would bring in $225,000, and 50,000 skins would be $50,000, totaling 
$275,000, while the sale of cattle and hogs would bring the total to 
this figure, $600,000. This report estimated the imports at $325,000. 
Austin’s report gave this district a large number of gins and mills, 
setting down in the municipalities of Austin and Brazoria thirty cotton- 
gins, two steam sawmills and grist mills, six water-power mills and 
many run by oxen and horses. There was one water-power mill for 
sawing lumber and running machinery in Gonzales. 

The Department of Nacogdoches contained four municipalities, 
Nacogdoches, San Augustine, Liberty, and Jonesboro, with a pop¬ 
ulation of nine thousand, one thousand of this number being negroes. 
Besides the municipalities there were four other towns in this district: 
Anahuac, Bevil, Teran, and Teneha. This section was not as well 
developed as it should have been, Almonte thought. He somewhat 

1 Colonel J. N. Almonte made an inspection of Texas for the Mexican gov¬ 
ernment in 1834. A translation of his report is published in the Southwestern 
Historical Quarterly , XXVIII, 177-222. 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 419 

unfairly attributed its backwardness to neglect and indifference of 
the empresarios. As a matter of fact, it was primarily due to restric¬ 
tions of the federal government. 

The trade of Nacogdoches was estimated by Almonte to be 
$470,000. The exports were estimated at 2,000 bales of cotton, 90,000 
skins of deer, otter, and beaver, and 5,000 head of cattle, equal in 
value to $205,000. There was an excess of $60,000 of imports over 
exports for the year, which fact Almonte accounted for by the 
stock in the stores of the dealers. 

There were twice as many cattle in this department as in that 
of the Brazos, but the price of cattle per head was the same. There 
were sixty thousand head of swine, which would soon furnish an 
article of export. 

Almonte and Austin are both indefinite as to the number of gins 
and mills in this section. Austin said: “The municipalities of Lib¬ 
erty and Nacogdoches are very well provided with mills and gins, and 
there is great progress in this industry in all parts of Texas.” 

As to transportation of their products, Austin mentioned a steam¬ 
boat in the Bay of Galveston. He also indicated that a company had 
been formed to bring one to the Brazos river. Apparently this plan 
was realized, for the next year Almonte reported a steamboat plying 
on the Brazos and two others expected for the Neches and Trinity 
rivers. An item in the Telegraph in 1836 reported that another steam¬ 
boat, the Yellow Stone, had arrived to run on the Brazos. Plans for 
bettering the roads were going forward with rapidity, although the 
roads were described as fairly good as they were. 

The statistics of both Almonte and Austin are open to question. 
Almonte’s two months’ tour was too brief for a comprehensive under¬ 
standing of conditions, and Austin, although better informed than 
Almonte, may have exaggerated in the effort to make a strong case for 
Texas in its application for statehood. 

The labor on Texas farms was done by the farmer and his slaves, 
if he owned any. The Texans were slave holders, but not on an 
extensive scale. Large plantations with a hundred or more negroes 
did not gain the foothold in Texas that they had in the old South. 
One negro family was more often the rule than a crew of fifty slaves. 
The farmer ordinarily worked side by side with his slaves. Colonel 
Jared E. Groce had about a hundred negroes, the largest number 
owned by one man in Texas prior to the revolution. It was estimated 
in 1836 that there were 5,000 negroes in Texas, 30,000 Anglo- 
Americans, 3,470 Mexicans, and 14,200 Indians. The estimate of 
5,000 negroes is a rather large increase over the 2,000 in Almonte’s 
report, although there had been a rapid immigration in the latter part 
of 1834 and throughout 1835. Absentee ownership did not exist in 
Texas, nor was there much free labor for hire. At this early date 
land was so cheap and so easily obtained that even the poor man 
had an opportunity to obtain a farm where he could make a living 


420 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


with a minimum amount of labor. It was the custom for neighbors 
to exchange labor. The work was often long and hard; and the 
returns, as now, were not always commensurate with the labor. Crude 
methods of cultivation, overflows, and drouths were the principal 
causes of poor yields. 

All authorities agreed that cotton was the most extensively culti¬ 
vated crop and the best adapted to the soil. The statistics of Almonte 
and Austin bear this out. . . . 

Cotton was planted late in February or early in March and it was 
ready for the first picking by the last of July or the middle of August, 
according to the season. Frequently they were picking as late as 
December. 

Indian corn or maize was the staple food for man and beast. As 
late as 1856, Frederick Law Olmstead complained of the steady diet 
of corn-bread and bacon, which was set before him in his journey 
over Texas. Two crops of corn were sometimes planted and har¬ 
vested. The first one was planted about the middle of February, after 
there was little danger of a freeze, and harvested in the summer; 
the second crop was planted in June for fall harvesting. Mrs. Holley 
stated that seventy-five bushels to the acre had been gathered, but 
that this was not the rule, as the farmers did not put enough labor 
on the corn crop to produce that amount. Most of the crop was 
required for home consumption. The Texas Gazette of May 22, 1830, 
republished a chapter of a book which stated that the “produce of 
last season consisted of 1,000 bales of cotton, 150,000 bushels of 
corn, and 140 hogsheads of sugar.” The cotton was mostly shipped 
to New Orleans, and the surplus corn and other products to Mata- 
moros, Tampico, and Vera Cruz. This article declared that wheat, 
rye, oats, and barley were grown to some extent in the undulating 
districts, where they yielded abundantly, but that the scarcity of mills 
and the low price discouraged their production. Austin, on the con¬ 
trary, reported: “The sowing of wheat has not progressed so much, 
because the climate is not suitable for this grain in the settled region 
near the coast.” 

If the farmer had sufficient force and suitable land, he usually 
tried his hand at raising sugar-cane and manufacturing sugar and 
molasses. According to Mrs. Holley, sugar-cane was beginning to 
be cultivated extensively in 1836. She described Texas cane as supe¬ 
rior to that of both Arkansas and Louisiana. In 1849 the State 
Gazette reported the average yield on a Brazos plantation to be half 
a hogshead to the acre, estimating 1,000 pounds to the hogshead. The 
system of cultivation was not so advanced as in Louisiana. 

Tobacco and indigo were indigenous plants, but under Mexican 
law the tobacco trade was a state monopoly and production was 
restricted. Indigo was little cultivated. It was manufactured in 
families for domestic use, and was preferred to the imported indigo. 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 421 


Sweet potatoes were extensively cultivated upon the drier prairies. 
Melons abounded everywhere. Beans, peas, Irish potatoes, and a 
variety of vegetables were grown in the gardens. The Texans usually 
had a fall and winter garden as well as a spring and summer one. 
In 1830 James Hope, “gardner and seedsman,” was advertising his 
Connecticut garden seed and his fruit trees at San Felipe. Fruit trees 
produced abundant crops. 

Stock raising was commonly considered to bring the largest returns 
with the least expenditure of time and effort. Austin did not attempt 
to estimate the number of cattle in his report of 1833. An editorial 
in a contemporary newspaper summed up the whole matter in this 
comparison: 

Corn, sweet potatoes, butter, honey, and every article of subsistence are in 
demand at this place and bring a good price. Corn is worth $1.50 per bushel, 
and butter 25 cents per lb. The farmer or planter without the resources for 
acquiring a strong force (say 50 hands) to engage in sugar making may turn 
beneficially his attention to the planting of cotton with from 5 to 20 hands; 
and we know several who successfully undertake this branch of agriculture 
with no other aid than the white individuals of their own family; if, however, 
he prefer a more easy mode of living, he may raise horses, mules, horned cattle, 
or hogs. 

Mrs. Holley at the same time discussed stock raising as follows: 

The extensive natural pastures found in the prairies furnish peculiar facili¬ 
ties for rearing horses, black cattle, hogs, sheep and goats. They require no 
attention but to be branded and prevented from straying too far from home 
and becoming wild. Large quantities of mules are raised annually, many of 
which are carried to the United States; and it proves a very lucrative business, 
inasmuch as the labor and expense in rearing them are trifling and the price 
they command good. ... In many parts of Texas, hogs may be raised in large 
numbers on the native mast. Acorns, pecans, hickory-nuts, etc., with a variety 
of nutritious grasses and many kinds of roots, afford them ample sustenance 
during the year. 

Beef, hides, milk, butter, pork, lard, poultry, and lumber were some 
of the products of Texas besides the products of the soil. An 
article in the Telegraph says in 1835 that many of the settlers counted 
their herds by the hundred; and that great numbers of cattle were 
annually purchased and driven to New Orleans by drovers who 
visited the country for that purpose. 

On the whole the people seem to have lived on what they had 
their slaves produced. Land was so cheap and fertile that they made 
no effort to conserve the soil, but planted the same crops on the same 
land year after year. 

II. Life on the Plantation 

The Peach Point Plantation was opened in December, 1832, west 
of the Brazos river, ten miles below Brazoria. The conditions the 


422 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


first year were unhappy. Cholera and malaria scourged the settle¬ 
ments in 1833, and a letter from Perry to Austin describes their effects: 

Our family has not been entirely clear of sickness since June and part of 
the time scarcely enough well of either servants or whites to wait on the sick 
and at the worst of our sickness there was not a Physician could be had or 
a neighbour to call to see us. 

With regard to our crops and improvements we have done verry little since 
the middle of June as the blacks were all sick as well as ourselves—we made 
a good crop of corn and pumpkins about 8 or 900 bushels of corn and plenty 
of pumpkins. We planted 13 acres of cotton the last week in June which bid 
fair to do pretty well but the early frost has injured it much. As it had not 
commenced opening we do not expect much of a crop. Cotton is now a fine 
price in N. O. from 16 to 18 cts. There is fine crops in this neighborhood and 
I am told all over the colony where the overflow did not injure it. 

Since the Day Book did not begin until 1837, and the first crop 
recorded in the Record Book is that of 1838, there is an interval of 
four years to be bridged over. This gap can only be spanned by 
Perry’s correspondence. His expectations of good crops for 1834 
as forecast in a letter to Austin did not come true. In January, 1835, 
he reported that the cotton crop had been very small. This was partly 
due to small acreage, incident to opening the plantation, and in part 
was due to ravages of cotton worms, which destroyed about one-third 
of the crop. Such cotton as he harvested Perry shipped to New 
Orleans and sold for sixteen cents a pound. To his factors he wrote: 
“The cotton crop in this country was verry fine with the exception 
of some 5 or 6 plantations in my neighborhood which was destroyed 
by the worms.” 

It will be recalled that Perry had settled at Chocolate Bayou before 
moving to Peach Point. Evidently there was some question as to 
the advisability of closing out the establishment there, for Austin 
wrote Perry, “I am greatly in favor of keeping up the Chocolate bayou 
stock farm, and intend to spend some of my time there—the place 
is of no value except for stock, but is good for that purpose.” That 
he was guided by Austin’s wishes and retained the Chocolate Bayou 
ranch is indicated by occasional entries in the Day Book. 

A letter from Perry to Austin in May, 1835, indicates the progress 
made in the plantation. He wrote: 

I have made arrangements to settle our Dickenson and Clear Creek lands 
and within the summer have the others settle[d] we have about 65 or 70 acres 
in cotton this year but the season since the 1st Mar. has been so dry that 
prospects for crops are bad so far. 

In November of the same year Moses Austin Bryan, Perry’s step¬ 
son, wrote: “am rejoiced to hear that you are all in good health and 
getting along so well in the way of picking out cotton.” 

The next year the country was in turmoil and confusion incident 
to the revolution. Early in the year Perry was advised to take his 
family to a place of safety because of possible uprising of negroes 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 423 


and dangers from Indians. Three days after this letter was written, 
Perry wrote that he was at Lynch’s Ferry and that he had not gotten 
the “waggon across the San Jacinto.” At the time he was undecided 
whether to take his negroes any further or not. This move was part 
of the so-called “Runaway Scrape.” Perry decided to leave his family 
on San Jacinto Bay. Together with several of his negro men, he 
joined James Morgan on Galveston Bay, where he assisted in the 
building of fortifications to keep communications open to New 
Orleans. As a consequence of this absence from home during the 
planting season, the crops for 1836 were short and hardly adequate 
for food and seed for the next year. Perry contracted with the 
Schooner Colonel Fannin to carry his crop of twenty-two bales to 
Messrs. John A. Merle & Company of New Orleans. In the letter 
notifying this company of shipment he inquired whether he could 
obtain a loan of two or three thousand dollars for April or May, 
1837, if the crop prospects were good at that time. The twenty- 
two bales did not go by the Colonel Fannin as is seen from the follow¬ 
ing letter. 

Enclosed you will also receive a Bill of Lading pr Schooner Julias Ceiser 
for twenty two Bales of Cotton, the whole amount of my crop, which I hope 
you will receive in good order and get a good price for it as I need all I can 
get and more too. 

There is no record of the 1837 crop. Conditions could not have 
been prosperous, for Perry was borrowing money as is seen from 
the following letter from his factor. 

Money is very scarce here [New Orleans]. If we can possibly advance the 
$500 you speak of we will enclose it to Mrs. Perry. 

New cotton begins to come in July and ranges from 10 to 12c in price we 
fear Cotton will not go above 10c this season. 

Peach Point in its beginning was primarily a cotton plantation, 
with corn and other products to supply the plantation needs. It is 
not until the fifties that sugar-cane becomes the leading crop. Begin¬ 
ning with 1838 there is a fairly comprehensive record of the cotton 
crop through 1849, giving the records of the pickers by name, the 
total weight of the crop, the number of bales, the price of the crop, 
a partial account of the outlay for the crop, and observations on the 
weather. While a few references were made to the planting of 
corn, it was not until 1846 and 1847 that a full record was given of 
the corn yield. The records for this crop are never as complete as 
are those for cotton. The records for cane and its products began 
in 1848. The daily routine of the plantation is most fully illustrated 
in the farm journal for 1848 kept from day to day by Stephen S. 
Perry, the eldest son of James F. Perry. 2 This journal began on 

2 See pages 441-451 , below. 


424 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


January 16. The last entry was for the twenty-fourth of November; 
but there are no entries for July and September, only two for August, 
and one entry for October. This journal recorded labor routine, 
delinquencies of the slaves, and weather conditions, presenting in 
brief a picture of labor conditions on the plantation. 

When the journal began, the ginning of the 1847 crop was still 
going on; and, indeed, the last bale was not ginned until March 17, 
1848, by which time some of the early cotton for 1848 was coming 
up, though part of the 1848 crop was not yet planted. The prepara¬ 
tion of the ground began on February 8, with the pulling of the cotton 
stalks and on March 9 they were still breaking up cotton stalks. In 
the meantime the ploughs were throwing up cotton ridges so that 
the cotton planting started on March 1. The year before the planting 
had started eleven days later. The cotton planted early was coming 
up before all of the cotton land was prepared for the seed. By 
March 31 the first ploughing of the cotton had begun and was finished 
by April 12; on May 1 the second ploughing started, the hoes were 
going at the same time as the second ploughing. On the first of 
May the cotton in the prairie field was replanted because a third of 
it was missing. Mr. Perry noted by the middle of June that the crop 
was fine, being nearly as high as his head. All the middles had been 
ploughed out by June 20, and the hoeing was finished within a week, 
thus “laying by the cotton.” The negroes were free for other crops 
and other work until cotton picking began on July 31. The total crop 
of 154,188 pounds in the seed had been picked by October 11. 

Besides attending to the cultivation of the other crops of corn, 
potatoes, and cane, the hands were occupied in splitting rails, getting 
board timber and basket timber, tearing down and rebuilding fences, 
making and cleaning out ditches, shelling corn, killing hogs, scaring 
the birds from the corn, hauling wood, working on the roads, build¬ 
ing Ben’s chimney, killing a beef, and attending to brood sows and 
their litters. No work was done on Sunday. 

Turning to the annual statistics, the 1838 cotton crop was gathered 
between the fourth of September and some time in December—“the 
date knot nown precisely”—by fifteen pickers, among whom were 
Ben, Peter, Bill, Doctor, Sam, Dick, John, Beck, Mary, Chaney, 
George, and Ned. The fifteenth hand picked one day. The gang 
picked 667 pounds a day near the beginning of the season and 3,214 
pounds as the season advanced. The 1838 crop for the entire plan¬ 
tation was 127 bales of which number Dick, Sam, and Bill owned one 
and one-half bales. 

The next year there were twenty pickers with Betsey, Caroline, 
Margaret, Bob, Clenen, Allin, Frank, Tom, Sam, and Simon in the 
crew in addition to those of the previous year. The crop lacked 
21 bales of being as large as that of 1838, being 106 bales. The 
average weight of the bales was 545 pounds, and netted 6 y 2 cents 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 425 

per pound. This crop had been hauled to the river by the sixteenth 
of January. 

The plantation was apparently divided into three fields for cotton. 
These are designated in the record for 1840 as “Prairie field,” “Field 
by the Gin,” and “Field by the House.” The crop of 106 bales was 
gathered by twenty-five pickers. Bill and Peter were expert pickers, 
Bill picking 325 pounds on August 26 and Peter 334 pounds on the 
same day. The average of the other twenty-two pickers for this 
day was 196 pounds. The yield for this year was classified as 40 
“first rate” bales, 59 “good” bales, and 4 “not so good.” All of the 
crop was in by October 26. The shortness of the season may be 
explained by a note under date of September 1 that the worms had 
destroyed the cotton. 

Each year the number of bales decreased, only 89 being ginned in 
1841. In this year the pickers numbered 19; however, George picked 
only two days. Peter and Bill kept the lead, with Caroline and Bob 
close followers. Turner, Purnell, Simon, and Allin were the poorest 
pickers, gathering in one week 780, 575, 510, and 580 pounds respect¬ 
ively. This was the same week that Peter had 1,470 pounds to his 
credit. This year’s crop bore out Perry’s statement that “the pros¬ 
pects for crops are rather bad,” and that the blacks had been sick. 

The picking in 1842 must have been very scattering, because it 
took nineteen negroes from July 1 to October 20 to pick 50 bales. 
The largest amount gathered in one day by any picker was 293 
pounds. 

By May 26, the 1843 crop was blooming and on August 15 pick¬ 
ing had begun. Peter picked a total of 8,131 pounds for the season; 
Caroline 7,632; Bill 6,725; Bob 6,992; Ben 5,975; Betsey 6,534; 
Beckey 5,436; Chaney 5,241; Dock 5,443; George 5,086; John 5,764; 
Ned 5,815; Turner 2,783; Purnell 4,569; Allin 3,786; Mary 809; 
Westley 1,899; Sam 456; Jim 3,468, L. Ben 3,398; thus making a 
grand total of 101,403 pounds of seed cotton. The 61 bales delivered 
at Aycock’s warehouse weighed 29,328 pounds. A letter from Guy 
M. Bryan to his friend Rutherford B. Hayes explains the short crop 
of this and the previous years: 

... we have had for the last two months the most unprecedented rains. 
The whole country has been under water. The Brazos River has again over¬ 
flowed its banks. The crops which were most promising have been cut off 
one fourth. My father who had a most promising crop will not make more 
than 60 bales of cotton. Our lands which cost three thousand dollars annual 
tax, bring us in scarce a farthing. We are thus dependent upon our cotton 
crop for our active means, and that having failed for this year, I fear we 
will be unable to pay expenses. I however hope to obtain of a large cotton 
planter, who has made a tolerable crop, and owes us 15 or 16,000$ and is an 
honest man a sufficient sum to answer my purposes and enable me to go to 
the United States. . . . The crops of the country have nearly failed for three 
years in succession. 


426 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Despite worms in the gin house field by September 4, and their 
spread to the other cotton fields, the 1844 crop amounted to 118 
bales, averaging 537 pounds each, or a total of 63,326 pounds of 
lint cotton. Of this crop 40 bales made up the better cotton, while 
there were three ordinary bales, and three stained ones. In addition 
to the workers of 1843, Silvy, Dave, Elish, Chariot, Big George, Jill, 
Lowey, and L. John picked part of the time, numbering 28 hands in 
all—Turner was not on the roll. Peter, Bill, Betsey, Caroline, and 
George were leading the field in the amount picked. This crop had 
to be replanted in May, while the first cotton planted was blooming 
on the twenty-second of May. The net proceeds were 4 l /z cents a 
pound. 

The banner year of the plantation was 1845 when the yield was 
130 bales. The twenty-two hands gathered 77,233 pounds of seed 
cotton from the Prairie field, of which 53,699 pounds was classed 
as “fine” cotton; and 90,412 pounds in the Timber field. The hands 
were irregular in their picking—Allin, Bob, Betsey, and Caroline lost 
from the field 4 days each; Chariot and Mary, 2 days each; Purnell, 
3 days; Bill and John Jack, 5 days; Ben, 39; Beckey and Westley, 
14; Clenen, 34; Chaney, 11; John, 12; George and Silvey, 7 each; 
Lowey, 9; Ned, 33; and Robert, 33 days. Sam picked three days. 

The cotton crop of 1846 was very short. There were 10 bales, 
two of which were silk cotton. The lint total of these 10 bales 
amounted to 4,660 pounds. How poor the picking was may be judged 
by the fact that those hands who could pick around 400 pounds per 
day picked from 51 to 116 pounds per day. 

In 1847 the cotton planting started on March 11, and the hands 
went into the field on August 10 to begin gathering the white staple. 
On August 20 the cotton worm made its first appearance. Mary 
Ann, Simon, Neece, Jerry, a negro belonging to Mrs. Jack, Gustus, 
Morris, Lucy, Dick, yellow Simon, and Tom were new hands on the 
record book. By November 8 the twenty-seven hands had picked 
193,000 pounds. By November 8, Hill, the overseer had baled 8 
bales, and the last of the 105 was not ginned until March 17, 1848. 
The 105 bales came to 55,262 pounds. 

The planting of the 1848 cotton was described above. Twenty- 
three hands, starting on August 1, had gathered the crop by October 
20, although they did not finish baling until February 8, 1849. The 
82 bales weighed 42,108 pounds. There were 3,057 pounds of seed 
cotton classified as “fine.” 

The following year, 19 hands, Allin, Bill, Ben, Bob, Betsey, Becky, 
Clenen, Caroline, Chaney, George, John, Ned, Mary, Peter, Robert, 
Sam, Silvey, Westley, Simon, began picking on August 9 and by 
October 8 were picking the last of the thin cotton, when none of the 
hands picked over 100 pounds per day. The 39 bales of the 1849 
crop, weighing 18,221 pounds, averaged 467 pounds each. There 
was no record of the 1850 crop in either of the books. 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 427 


The first picking of the 1851 crop yielded 20 bales of good quality, 
weighing 10,339 pounds. The nine bales of the second picking came 
to 4,457. The last picking brought the total to 38 bales. This is 
the last record of a cotton crop on the plantation in either the Record 
Book or the Day Book. 

Corn was the staple food of the South; indeed, in one form or 
another it was the main dependence in Texas. The records show that 
very little flour was bought. As early as 1833, Perry wrote that they 
had raised “8 or 900 bushels of corn and plenty of pumpkins.” 

The journal for Perry’s plantation is most satisfactory for 1848, 
and that year is, therefore, taken to illustrate the routine of corn 
cultivation. Rotation of crops was practiced to some extent at Peach 
Point, unlike many of the plantations, as is evidenced by this entry 
of April 18: “Commenced ploughing corn, hilling it up and ploughing 
out the middles. Corn looks well indeed, wants rain very much. 
Good stand in all of it except the cotton ground, replant not all come 
up.” The first step in the planting of the corn was the clearing of 
the ground. The corn planting began on February 17, and was finished 
on the morning of February 25. The corn came up slowly that year, 
necessitating the minding of the birds from February 26, when the 
corn began coming up, through March 10, at which time all the corn 
was not yet up. The ploughs started in the corn on March 23 and 
the hoes began the next day and continued for a week. Stephen 
Perry under March 24 made this note: “we did not harrow our corn 
this year, I do not think we did right we smoothed down the ridges 
with the hoes.” By April 7 both corn and cotton needed rain; the 
corn, however, as was natural, was suffering most. On April 18 they 
commenced ploughing the corn a second time, to hill it up, and plough 
out the middles. The stand of corn in 1848 was good except in the 
bottom field which had been replanted. Seven ploughs were running 
in the corn with the hoes on April 19. The third ploughing started 
on May 12 and was finished on the 18, but the hoeing continued. A 
corn crop furnished plenty of labor after it was laid by, for it had 
to be gathered and there was the shucking and shelling as occupations 
for rainy days. It was not unusual in Texas to plant two crops 
of corn a year, but there is nothing to indicate that this was done 
on the Perry plantation. They did plant potatoes in the corn. 

As a rule, there was more corn raised on the plantation than was 
consumed there. In 1838 the Record Book showed that 15 bushels 
of corn and 11 bushels of corn in the shuck were sold; in 1839 a sur ~ 
plus of 31 bushels of corn, 54 bushels unshucked corn, and 23 bushels 
of corn meal were sold; in 1841, out of 73 loads, 10 bushels of corn, 
9 of meal, and $1.25 worth of “hommoney” were sold; in 1842, 1 
bushel of seed corn and 30 bushels of meal; in 1843, 10 bushels of 
corn and 83 bushels of meal. In 1844, they sold 150 bushels of corn, 
contracting to grind 20 of it into meal, 57 barrels of unshucked corn, 
5 bales of fodder, and 80 bushels of meal. The following year the 


428 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


plantation disposed of 228 bushels of corn, 20 bushels in the shuck 
and 30 bushels of meal. The crop of 1846 amounted to 3,800 bushels 
and was gathered in September. Of this amount, 123 bushels and 
116 sacks of corn, 11 barrels of corn in the shuck, and 17 bushels 
of meal were sold. In 1847 the crop, which was planted between 
March 2 and 6, yielded 92 loads, estimated at 2,300 bushels. They 
record as sold, 24 bales of fodder, no bushels and 114 sacks of 
corn, 42 barrels of corn in the shuck, and 8 bushels of meal. Of 
the 1848 yield of 144 loads (about 3,600 bushels), 60 bushels were 
sold. From the crop of 1850, the memorandum shows as sold 583 
bales of fodder and 58 barrels of corn. From this time until 1863, 
there are no records of any sales except 176 bushels in 1858. In 
1863, the overseer, Mr. Ayers, sold 1,162 bushels of corn and 23,973 
pounds of fodder to the government, and 25 bushels of meal to 
various civilians. The price varied from seventy-five cents to a dollar 
per bushel. Apparently the plantation never had to buy com or meal, 
but always had sufficient to supply their needs. The custom was to 
charge toll in kind for grinding corn at the mill. All this com may 
not have been raised on the Perry land. Part of it may have come 
from the mill, no doubt some of the meal did. 

The crop which was apparently taking the place of cotton in the 
fifties was sugar-cane. Phillips, quoting from P. A. Champonier's 
Statement of the Sugar Crop , says, “Outside of Louisiana the indus¬ 
try took no grip except on the Brazos River in Texas, where in 1858 
thirty-seven plantations produced about six thousand hogsheads.” 8 
The Day Book showed that Mr. Perry was buying over two barrels 
of sugar a year after 1843, and in 1847 h e bought 1,125 pounds. He 
sold Andrew Churchill a barrel (of 234 pounds) of sugar in 1847. 
This large purchase in 1847 may have been due to his buying in 
large quantities to get it cheaper for himself and neighbors. In 
1846 he paid Major James P. Caldwell, from whom he usually bought 
his sugar supply, $12 for a barrel of molasses. It is uncertain when 
Perry commenced raising cane. In the journal for 1848 under date 
of April 15, Stephen entered this statement, “Ploughing cane and 
hoing cotton. First time the cane has been ploughed this year.” There 
is nothing to indicate that this was the first cane crop on the planta¬ 
tion. A heavy frost on the fourth of November, the day on which 
the cutting had begun, killed the cane. By November 10, the cane 
was cut. These are the only facts known about the crop except that 
there is no record of their having bought any sugar in that year 
or in 1849. I n November, 1849, the purchase of 180 yards by 39 
yards of sugar cane for seed was made from James P. Caldwell. 
This was i 4 % 0 o acres at $40.00 and amounted to $57.20. James 
Hext, overseer for Perry, and a man by the name of Dillon measured 
the cane. 

* Phillips, U. B., American Negro Slavery, 168. 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 429 

The sugar mill was not installed on the plantation until 1850. 
In May of that year the sugar house was built, and Close and Adams 
installed the mill and engine in October. The sugar making began 
on December 12, 1850. A few days before this a severe freeze had 
spoiled “the most of the seed cane which was put up in malay” 
[matlay]. 4 The breaking of the jack chain delayed the sugar making 
for a day and a half. On January 1 the cane had been rolled, but it 
became too sour to work up. The 1850 crop produced 165 barrels of 
molasses, of which four barrels were reserved for home use, two for 
W. J. Bryan, and one for M. A. Bryan. In June, 45 barrels of sugar 
were shipped in the General Hamer to T. Crosby. William N. Payne 
charged $354.80 for 100 molasses barrels of mixed sizes, 68 large size 
barrels, 2 meat barrels, 2 molasses barrels, 8 sugar buckets, and 52 
hogsheads, while Horace Chadwick (apparently the same name some¬ 
times spelled Shattuck), charged $63 for 42 molasses barrels to pack 
sugar in. Out of the crop of 1851, 202 barrels of molasses and 60 
hogsheads of sugar were shipped; 2 barrels of sugar being sent to 
Rosanah P. Brown, Delaware, Ohio. The expenses for the sugar 
crop of 1851 included: $25 for work done on the furnace of the sugar 
house; $192 to Jesse Munson for making 96 hogsheads of sugar; $50 
to W. N. Payne for making 50 “hogsheads”; and $433.92 to Horace 
Chadwick for making 321 barrels and 5 hogsheads; besides the hire 
for extra slaves. 

There were several interruptions and hindrances to the sugar 
making of 1852. At first the pump refused to work; then the furnace 
mouth gave way and there was a delay until a mason could come 
to rebuild it. On the 13th of November they were interrupted by the 
burning of the corn house and stables with over 3,000 bushels of 
corn and most of the ploughs, harrows, and carts. They saved about 
150 bushels of corn. The uncut cane was injured by hard frost and 
ice in the early part of January. They had begun cutting and haul¬ 
ing the cane on October 23, and on January 10 finished boiling the 
last of the crop. The extra expense for hired help, including $93.33 
to Cash for overseeing, was $646.60. The warehouse bill from Crosby 
showed that 450 barrels of molasses and 71 hogsheads of sugar from 
this crop had been stored; there were then, on March 23, 75 barrels 
of molasses and one barrel of sugar. On August 15 there was an 
entry that 72 barrels had been shipped to W. Hendly and Company 
of Galveston in two shipments. Shattuck’s bill for making and re¬ 
pairing barrels for the 1852 and 1853 crops was $651.23. Munson 
charged $420 for boiling the sugar and serving as engineer for the 
1852 crop. The records for 1852 are meager. 

4 Seed cane was stored in “matlay” for the winter. Phillips (American 
Negro Slavery, 244) describes the process as the laying of the stalks in their 
leaves with the tops turned to the south to keep out the north wind, with the 
leaves of each layer covering the butts of that below, and with dirt over the 


430 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


The 1854 sugar crop was finished by December 27, and a good 
crop was made. The net proceeds on 53 barrels after paying stor¬ 
age, expense to Galveston, and expenses after leaving Galveston, 
which included freight, wharfage, auction charges, cooperage, interest, 
commission, and guaranteeing, were $5,364.49. After deducting 
$2,579.63 for expenses, the net proceeds of the 1855 crop were $6,- 
781.13. The 180 barrels and 140 hogsheads were marketed in Balti¬ 
more, Galveston, and New York. The price for sugar from 1851 
on varied from five cents to six cents per pound. During the Civil 
War it was higher. In 1863, Mr. Ayers, in Stephen S. Perry’s ab¬ 
sence, sold $415 worth of sugar at fifty cents a pound. 

Potatoes, like corn, were a staple food on the plantation. In 
1837 th e current expenses were charged with $5-5° f° r potatoes. 
This may have been for seed as this is the year they were so abundant. 
This is the last record of potatoes purchased until 1847, when 3 bar¬ 
rels were bought. On the contrary, several barrels were sold every 
season. In 1845 some 200 bushels of sweet potatoes and 18 bushels of 
Irish potatoes were sold. After 1853 there are no records of sales 
except five bushels in 1857. 

Tobacco was a minor product of the plantation. In 1846 Perry 
sent R. and D. G. Mills, of Brazoria, 2,526 pounds at six cents per 
pound with the understanding that they should give him half of the 
profits above that amount. This is the only record of transactions 
in tobacco. 

The record contains various entries of miscellaneous products sold. 
These included eggs, sometimes by the keg, chickens, muscovy ducks, 
turkeys, geese, butter, pecans, tallow, hominy, and hard soap. The 
sales were not in large quantities nor were they made regularly. 

There is no record of how many hogs they had or how they 
raised them except in the 1848 farm journal. Between January 27 
and the first of February, 47 hogs were killed. This was probably 
only a small part of the number killed that winter, for Texas farmers 
believed the old saw that meat killed before Christmas kept better, 
and they would hardly have gone that late in the season without fresh 
meat. On January 31, the entry reads, “Tearing down and rebuilding 
fences. Hunting sowes and pigs, put nine sowes with about forty 
young pigs in the Prairy field.” From 1839 to 1849 there was a grad¬ 
ual increase in the amounts of pork and lard sold, after which time 
the sales fell off abruptly. In 1848 they sold 12 hogs, 1,744 pounds 
of bacon at eight cents, and 334 pounds of lard at nine cents per 
pound. In 1843 and the two following years the sales of pickled 
pork averaged about 300 pounds at eight cents per pound. 

The Chocolate Bayou stock farm was kept as Austin desired, 
but there were few entries made in regard to it save two pages 

last butts in the mat. Perry bought by the yard as the cane lay on the ground. 



THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 431 


under “Pleasant Bayou Ranch,” giving the accounts from 1856 
through 1859. There was exchange of labor to some extent between 
Peach Point and Pleasant Bayou, as is seen in the journal of Stephen 
Perry. This is shown in the entry of April 17, “Need left this morn¬ 
ing for Chocolate Bayou (Sam coming in his place)”; on the 19th 
this additional statement was entered, “Robert left for Choclet on 
the 17 of April with Need carryed two mules with him.” 

From the beginning, this place had been considered ranching land. 
In 1834 Austin instructed Perry to “collect all the stock you can 
in claims due me and put them on your farm at Chocolate Bayou, in 
your own brand.” From Peach Point they shipped out on an average 
of 13 hides a year at 7 and 8 cents. In one year they received $27 
for 15 hides. Very few beeves were sold from the plantation. In 
1839 they received $240 for cows; in 1840, $182; in 1845, $100 and 
a note for three cows at $10 each; in 1846, $40. There were no 
records of the sale of hides from Chocolate. They bought corn in 
small quantities occasionally. In 1847 and again in 1848, about 2,000 
pounds of corn was shipped Aycock for the use of Judge Low in 
payment of loans of corn from him. 

Edward Austin took charge of the Pleasant Bayou stock in 1846 
at the salary of $200 per annum with the provision that he make his 
wages out of the stock. N. S. (?) Davis had charge from 1856 
until as late as February 1859. He sold 233 beeves and five stags 
for $5,532. The expense account totaled $1,307.98, including articles 
purchased for the ranch and $200 for Davis’s services. In 1842, 
Edmund Andrews was charged with $300 worth of timber from 
Chocolate and Hopkins is charged with $500 for “Timber taken away 
and destroyed on my land on Chocolate Bayou.” It can not be deter¬ 
mined from these inadequate accounts whether the ranch was a finan¬ 
cial success or not. 

In the sketch of Perry’s life in the Planter, 1853, he is described 
as “One of the best planters and masters in the State.” When he 
came to Texas in 1831, Perry brought his slaves with him, but their 
number and qualities are unknown. There is no complete list of 
Perry’s slaves. The daily record of the cotton picking which was 
kept by name is the nearest to a list of the slaves. There are no 
records of purchase or sale of negroes except in two cases. In 1832, 
Austin wrote Perry as follows: 

I am sending you Simon and wish you to keep him close at work untill I 
return. He has been idle for so long that he will require a tight rein—he is 
in the habit of gambling—but he is a useful hand on a farm if he is kept close 
to his business. 

This would seem to indicate that Austin already had a negro by 
the name of Simon, while in 1836 he wrote to his brother-in-law: 

McKinstre has a very likely negro 27 years of age, healthy and a good field 
hand—he has ran away owing to a terrible whipping Me. gave him the other 


432 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


day, but I believe has no very bad habits—he asks twelve hundred dollars cash 
—I have an idea of buying him—what do you think of the price if I take him 
will send him to you untill I need him. 

Whether Perry advised it or not, Austin did pay $1,200 for an¬ 
other slave by the name of Simon, who is described as of a “dark 
complexion, age about 27 years and in good health. ,, This Simon 
is probably the one by that name on the records. In April, 1842, 
William Joel Bryan is debited on the Record Book with $1,000 paid 
to Hopkins for “negress Ann and child” and with $3,000 paid to Dr. 
Smith for “negress Tamar, negroes Donor and George.” On the 
same day, Joel is again debited with $1,000 to Emily M. Perry for boy 
Frank. A note to the side of the page reads: “Entered in Mrs. 
E. M. Perry’s Book.” In 1834 John R. Jones, who was selling out 
to go into the mercantile business, offered Perry his Missouri negroes 
in payment of a debt. In 1841 and again in 1848, Hamilton White 
offered to settle a debt for land with negroes. Before this, in 1837, 
George Hammeken had written Perry from New Orleans of an oppor¬ 
tunity to buy one Gouverneur’s slaves. Whether or not Perry closed 
with any of these proposals is not apparent. The list of field hands 
in the record is supposedly complete, but there is nothing to indicate 
the number of domestic slaves. 

There is scarcely anything in the records to indicate how the 
negroes lived. No punishments for the negroes are recorded. They 
seem to have been on the whole fairly healthy. The record for 1841 
is probably a representative year. In this year, Ben was out of the 
field on account of a snake bite. George was sick all of the cotton 
picking season of 1841. John and Becky were out a few days. Mary 
was away from the field 26 days, 17 of these following the birth of 
a son on October 11. This is the only record of the birth of a child 
to any of the slaves on the plantation; in fact, there are no records 
of there being any children unless this is implied in the labor of 
driving the birds away from the young corn. This sort of work would 
probably be done by children or infirm negroes. In 1848 Allin was 
sick practically all the Spring; Westley, for part of May; and Mary, 
during the fall. Stephen Perry, in his synopsis of the months of Jan¬ 
uary, February and March, said, “The atmosphere has become so 
impure, which has produced sickness among the negroes, they com¬ 
plain principally of pains in the breast and sides, sores, and ruma- 
tisms &c. &c.” As far as the farm journal carried the record in 
1848, the negroes lost from the field 115 days from sickness. The 
only record of any of Perry’s slaves running off was in an entry of 
May 30, 1848. “Tom ran away and was gone until June 7.” No 
reason was assigned for his running away. Nothing is shown as 
to the negroes social life. There is an entry in November, 1839, that 
they had a half day’s picking and that Sam was married that day. 

Perry hired out his own slaves, and in turn, employed the slaves 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 433 


of others as need arose. He frequently had to hire additional labor 
in the sugar making of the fifties. Such emergencies were met by 
mutual accommodation of neighbors, and not by hiring from a slave 
gang. In 1834 Edmund Andrews wrote asking, “have you none 
among those of Westall’s [slaves] that you will hire me for a cook.” 
John P. Borden in 1837 wrote to hire either Clara or Milly as a 
cook. In 1844 W. J. Bryan hired Frank, George, Clenen, Bob, Mary, 
and Silvy to assist with his cotton. The next year he hired Sam, 
Allin, Purnell, Westley, Ben, John, Ned, and Bill a total of sixty-two 
days to gin and bale his cotton. In June, 1855, Perry let Mr. Shat- 
tuck have a negro woman at $15 per month. The records indicate 
that Perry hired outside help more often than he let his slaves out. 
In 1843 he hired Ben and Jim at $10 per month from Dr. Leonard. 
From 1844 to 1850 he hired Jerry, Tom and George from Mrs. Laura 
H. Jack. Beginning with 1850 his expense account for hired slave 
labor was high during the season of sugar making, which required 
a large force to work day and night. He paid from $20 a month 
to $1.00 per day in the sugar season when the work was hard. He 
had hired nine slaves in 1851 from Mrs. Bell, of Bernardo, and from 
Edmund Arrington. This number was increased to eleven in 1852. 

If the slaves worked on Sunday, which they frequently had to 
do in sugar making, they received the $1.00 themselves. The ex¬ 
pense account for the sugar crop of 1852 included $45 “for home 
hands.” This may have been for their Sunday labor. In 1853 at 
least fifteen negroes were hired from Major Caldwell, Major Lewis, 
W. & J. Hopkins, Derant, and Guy M. Bryan; and ten for 1853. 
Perry had considerable trouble on account of hired negroes running 
away for a few days at a time—probably to see their families. Guy’s 
negroes, Henry, Sam, Simon, Bill, Nathan, and little John, ran away 
at various times during 1852 for a day or so at a time. Perry boarded 
the hired negroes, but he evidently charged their clothing to their 
masters. In 1853 he charged Major Lewis with six pairs of shoes 
and one blanket. In 1854 Estes was charged with one pair of shoes, 
which was deducted from Estes’ bill of $60. In 1855 Captain Black 
was charged with $15 for ten pairs of shoes for his negroes. In 1853 
Perry paid for negro hire $638.80. Of this amount, $28.50 was for 
Sunday work and $45 for the home hands. The one item of Lewis’s 
hire for 1854 was $800. 

There was some work which the slaves and overseers could not 
do, so white labor was called in. Most of the work done by white 
labor was shopwork, stocking ploughs, carpentering, installing the 
sugar mill, making barrels, papering the pantry, and engineering 
work on the sugar house and furnace. This would point to the infer¬ 
ence that the negroes on the plantation were field hands unskilled in 
any trade. Apparently they worked in gangs, for Bill had charge of 
a gang in 1848. 


434 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Over the negroes there passed a constant stream of overseers, 
beginning with William Joel Bryan, who was credited with $800 for 
service in “1837 & 1836” and “1838 & 1839.” The salaries for the 
overseers varied from $20 a month to $650 a year. It is uncertain 
how long Joseph M. Trimble served in 1838 after he was employed 
on January 2. There were three overseers in 1839: one Ramsey, K. 
K. Koontz, and David H. Love. Ramsey and Love were both dis¬ 
charged. M. M. Aycock served throughout the year of 1840. In 
1841 J. J. Harwell was employed for overseer, but it was not indicated 
how long he remained in Perry’s employment. Denman contracted 
to serve from December 18, 1841, to January, 1843. He became ill 
and left after a week’s service. Denman had a horse and the agree¬ 
ment was that if the horse were kept on the plantation it was to be 
used for its keep. On January 6, 1842, John Kellen began to serve 
as overseer. The two following overseers served for two years each: 
John Handcock for 1843 and 1844, and Chapman White, whose fam¬ 
ily lived in Mississippi, for 1845 an d 1846. William L. Hill agreed 
on March 22 to serve as overseer for $25 per month provided Perry 
was satisfied. He and Perry made a settlement on November 27 
of that year. Joseph Hext, who was overseer throughout 1849 an d 
1850, came for $20 a month with a contract to receive $25 if no bales 
were made and sold at seven cents. They made 39 bales of cotton 
in 1849. Jesse Munson, who was skilled in sugar making, and who 
had made up the 1851 sugar crop, was overseer from January 1 to 
October 19 when he began to make up the sugar crop of 1852. H. 
J. B. Cash took Munson’s place as overseer on October 19, 1852, and 
with the exception of short intervals he continued in Perry’s employ 
until January 1, 1855. A man who is called at various times Seiers, 
Sayer, and Seayer began overseeing on December 13, 1856, at the 
rate of $600 a year. He served one year and began on another but 
it is not recorded whether he worked the full two years or not. Hull, 
the last one of whom there is an account, was to receive $50 per 
month, and Perry agreed to furnish him beef, meal, molasses, and 
a servant to assist his wife and to cook and wash. 

The negroes were allowed small patches of their own in which 
they raised cotton, corn, and vegetables. In the calculations made 
about 1852 of the size of the various fields, the measurements of 
the prairie field were fifty-six acres after four acres had been taken 
out for garden and lot; the timber field was 187 acres after a deduc¬ 
tion of one acre for each of the nine “boys,” Simon, Sam, Ned, Ben, 
Bill, Peter, John, Clenen and Bob. African Bill and Sam each re¬ 
ceived $38.87 for their 1839 cotton crop; Bill and Peter were each 
credited with $55.02 for their 1840 and 1841 crop; Ned, $30.72 for his 
1841 cotton; Simon, $41.34 for his crop. In December 25, 1845, 
Clenen was debited to Ben for balance of $2.35 due him for rent of 
ground for 1845. The crops of Simon and Peter were short in 1846, 
being 73 pounds and 115 pounds respectively. On November 27, 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 43 S 


1847, this entry was made: “Bill African By 1,110 lb. Seed Cotten 
Crop of this year suppose to be worth i l / 2 c but to [be] paid at what 
my crop sells for—$16.05.” In 1854 the total crop for seven “boys” 
was 11,036 pounds. When one slave picked another slave’s cotton, 
he was credited on the Day Book with the money for the picking. 
The negroes raised corn as well as cotton. Ben sent sixteen and 
Simon six barrels of corn to Brazoria in 1848. In 1850 Bill was 
credited with 585 pounds of fodder at one cent a pound, and sixteen 
barrels of corn at $8.00. In 1855 Purnell is credited with 20^4 
bushels of corn. The negroes must have raised hogs, for Clenen sent 
fifty pounds of bacon worth $10 to M. B. Williamson in 1847, an d 
Ned sent sixty-one pounds to Canon. 

There is no record of clothing and supplies being issued to the 
negroes. On the other hand, the negroes are charged with shoes, 
tobacco, and merchandise from Mills and Bennett, Stringfellow and 
Aharns, and other firms. This may have been to keep account of 
what was spent on each slave, but the shoes and other articles are 
only charged against those negroes who are shown to have had a 
patch of ground, except George who is charged with one pair of shoes 
in 1850. The “coars” shoes and “Russett Brogans” ranged in price 
from $1.25 to Sam’s $3.50 boots in 1849. These merchandise orders 
may have come from the proceeds of their crop to supplement their 
regular clothing allowance. The merchandise included combs, flan¬ 
nel, $5.00 dress patterns, sugar, padlocks, net and cambric for two 
or three mosquito bars, buckets, and straw hats. Between 1839 an d 
1851 there are recorded thirteen pairs of shoes against Bill, three pairs 
being for Betcy; Sam had a pair for each year from 1839 to : ^42; 
Ben, Peter, Simon, and Ned, had five pairs each for the four years, 
one pair of these bought for Peter was for Silvey; three of John 
African’s twelve pairs were for Becky; Allin and Clenen had two 
pairs each between 1839 and 1842, and George had one pair. Sam is 
charged with twenty-three plugs of tobacco, Ben with seven, and 
Ned with fourteen plugs. 

Although the plantation was located on the Brazos, the products 
had to be hauled to Aycock’s in Brazoria, which was nine miles from 
the plantation, or to Crosby’s Landing. There is no record of a land¬ 
ing at Peach Point. If there was no immediate market or no boat 
to transport the goods, they were stored in the warehouse at the 
shipping point. Both Aycock and Crosby often acted as agents to 
dispose of the farm products. Frequently one of the various schoon¬ 
ers, Alamo, Josephine, John G. McNeel, Hamer, Oscar, Washington, 
S. M. Williams, or the Rein Deer, plying on the river was at the land¬ 
ing and received the goods at the end of the haul, and thus shipment 
was made directly to William H. Hendley and Company of Galveston, 
who disposed of the shipment in New Orleans, Baltimore, or New 
York. Perry did some banking business with the firm of R. Mills 
and Company of Brazoria, with its successor, R. and D. G. Mills, and 


436 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


with James Reed and Company of New Orleans. These firms sold 
the crops on different occasions, but William Hendley and Company 
did most of this work. Perry settled Crosby’s bill for storage and 
ferriage on March 23, 1853, for $118.75. This bill went back far 
enough to include $25.50 for storage of 408 barrels of molasses of the 
crop of 1850 and 1851 at 6 * 4 c. Much of the supplies for the planta¬ 
tion came from James Reed and Company, R. and D. G. Mills, and 
William Hendley and Company. Smaller items came from Mills and 
Bennett, Stringfellow and Aharns of Brazoria, Smith and Pilgrim, 
Blackwell and Schlecht, E. Purcell and Company, and Canfield and 
Slater of Galveston. It was not indicated where all of these firms 
were located. 

The 106 bales of the 1839 cotton crop netted $ 3,744 after deduct¬ 
ing $297 for the cost of the bagging and rope for baling. This year 
and the years immediately following were hard in Texas, because 
of the panic in the United States and the declining value of Texas 
currency due to the unsound finances. The currency depreciated 
steadily until it was worth about one-third of its face value. The 
prices, according to the Telegraph, were unreasonably high; pork was 
eighty cents per pound; a beef, from $70 to $80; corn meal $6 to 
$8; coffee per pound, fifty to sixty cents; butter, from $1.25 to $1.50 
per pound. Mills and Bennett shipped the 1840 crop of 103 bales, and 
the net proceeds were $4,561.73, after deducting cost of bagging, 
rope, charges to and at San Luis, and the balance of the interest. This 
is about two cents per pound more than the year before. R. and D. 
G. Mills handled the 89 bales of the 1841 crop and returned a net 
price of $4,338.58. The sum of $1,306.14 was the net price of the 
50 bales of the next year, while the 61 bales of 1843 yielded $2,700.78 
after the usual expenses incident to baling were paid. Perry ginned 
J. T. Hawkins’s 1843 crop also. He was to receive one-tenth of the 
net proceeds after R. and D. G. Mills had sold the crop plus $1.00 
per bale for packing. The extremely low price of three cents in 
1844 brought the net proceeds of the 118 bales to $3,133.45, or $174 
as the net yield per slave for each of the eighteen field hands. The 
largest cotton crop of the whole period, 130 bales, brought in only 
$4,644.55. It is a big jump from 130 bales to the 10 bale crop of 
1846. This brought $46 per bale, and $700 would cover the amount 
brought in by corn, meat, and lard as set down in the record. Thirty- 
six bales of the 105 bales of the 1847 crop brought $1,217.46. It was 
not recorded how much the 159 bales of the 1848, 1849, and 1851 
crops amounted to. The sale of sugar-cane products for 1852 through 
1856 added to that of 1863 both retail and wholesale as recorded 
was $14,236.29, but this is not likely to be a complete record. 

Perry wrote in 1833 that for the past several years farmers had 
raised cotton with great success, averaging “from 7 to 8 bales to the 
hand weighing from 540 to 560 each besides corn and everything 
else for the support of their farms.” But the 1838 crop was the 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 437 


only one with which Perry was ever able to equal this record. The 
crop that year averaged nine bales to each of the fourteen hands. 
The crop of 1845 averaged six bales to the hand, and the 1839 averaged 
five bales. The average for 1846 was one-half bale. The average 
per hand for the twelve years from 1838 through 1849 was 41/6 
bales. 

For brief glimpses of the life and environment of the family who 
owned and made Peach Point their home, we are dependent on frag¬ 
mentary sources. From the first Austin, who had visions of a splen¬ 
did, comfortable life on the plantation, had urged his brother-in-law 
to plant fruit trees and raise a garden. In fact, Austin himself was 
always gathering new varieties of peaches, plums, grapes, figs, and 
other fruits and trees to send home, even from Mexico. In 1839 one 
Holsteine was employed as “gaurdner from 1st Feby to 10th Sept/’ 
He was paid $140 for his J 1 /* months of service. On December 16, 
1840, a “sparrigrass” (asparagus) bed was planted, as well as vari¬ 
eties of fruits. In this year it was planned to have a row of fruit trees 
on each side of the road from the house to the gate. Gage and damson 
plums, peaches, apricots, figs, and pears were already growing, and 
Perry indicated from which trees he wished sprouts taken for the 
new orchard. In 1843 Guy M. Bryan wrote of the garden: 

It has been perfectly green throughout the whole of the winter. It is 
pleasant to a sore-eyed man to wander in the dead of winter through walks 
embowered with roses and fragrant shrubs of every kind and colour, to meet 
at every turn the orange the vine the fig and pomegranate, all of which abound 
in my mother’s yard, the products of our genial clime and mother’s guardian 
care. 

The place then presented a great contrast to that described by Austin 
in 1836 as ‘'still in the primitive log cabbins and wild shrubbery of 
the forest.” 

Mrs. Perry, the mistress of this pleasant home, was a woman of 
culture and education, trained at “The Hermitage,” a fashionable 
school for young ladies in New York. Her husband was a man of 
strong intelligence and public spirit, a factor in the economic progress 
of Texas from his arrival in 1831 to his death in 1853. Her son, 
Guy M. Bryan, was a graduate of Kenyon College, at Gambier, 
Ohio, where his brother Stephen Perry was also a student. Henry 
Perry, the youngest brother was a graduate of Trinity College, at 
Hartford, Connecticut. In 1848 Rutherford B. Hayes, Bryan’s class¬ 
mate and bosom friend, visited the plantation, and through extracts 
from his diary and comments of his biographer we can see how it 
impressed him: 

The House was beautifully situated on the edge of the timber, looking out 
upon a prairie on the south, extending five or eight miles to the Gulf, with a 
large and beautiful flower garden in front. 

Social life here afforded no end of entertainment—balls and parties rapidly 
followed one another, the guests riding ten, fifteen, and even twenty miles, 


438 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


arriving early in the afternoon, and remaining for nearly twenty-four hours, 
the great plantation house supplying room for all. An exceedingly agreeable, 
gay, and polished company . . . merriment and dancing until 4130 a. m.—like 
similar scenes elsewhere. Gentlemen breakfast from 10 till 11:30; all off by 
12 o’clock. 

January 25 [1849].—Ride with Uncle and Guy over Gulf Prairie to the 
mouth of the Bernard, to fish and eat oysters. A glorious day. Deer, cattle, 
cranes, wild geese, brant, ducks, plover, prairie hens, and the Lord knows what 
else, often in sight at the same time. The roar of the Gulf is heard for miles, 
like the noise of Niagara. Staked out horses with “lariats,” eat old Sailor 
Tom’s oysters, picked up shells, fished and shot snipe until 5 P. M., then rode 
home through clouds of mosquitoes, thicker than the lice or locusts of Egypt— 
like the hair on a dog’s back. Notice the eagle’s nest on the lone tree in the 
prairie and reach home glad to get away from the mosquitoes. 

Tuesday, January 30.—Ride with Mr. Perry over to Sterling McNeal’s plan¬ 
tation. A shrewd, intelligent, cynical old bachelor, full of “wise saws and 
modern instances”; very fond of telling his own experience and talking of his 
own affairs. Living alone he has come to think he is the “be all” and “end 
all” here. The haughty and imperious part of a man develops rapidly on one 
of these lonely sugar plantations, where the owner rarely meets with any 
except his slaves and minions. Sugar hogsheads vary from 1100 to 1800 lbs. 
White and black mechanics all work together. White men generally dissolute 
and intemperate. Returned, found Uncle Birchard returned from Oyster Creek, 
with the trophy of a successful onslaught upon a tiger cat. Glorious weather. 
One little shower. 

Monday, February 5.—Cold and clear. Forenoon spent with Stephen and 
the ladies—music and flirting. Afternoon rode up to Major Lewis’s. Three 
agreeable young ladies; music, singing, and dancing—city refinement and amuse¬ 
ment in a log cabin on the banks of the Brazos, where only yesterday the steam 
whistle of a steamboat was mistaken for a panther. 

It was in 1848, probably in preparation for the visit of this guest 
who was later to be President of the United States, that Mrs. Perry 
ordered silver ware “not to cost over $400,” with Austin’s seal to be 
engraved on each article. The service included coffee pot, tea pot, 
sugar bowl, cream pot, slop bowl, four ivory salt spoons, and one 
dozen each of tea spoons, dessert spoons, dining forks and dessert 
forks. 

Finally a word needs to be said of the two old volumes which 
form the principal source of this study. They are mildewed, blurred, 
and faded, so that the task of deciphering them is, in many places, 
extremely difficult. The memoranda which they contain were written 
for the use of the planter, without thought of the historian. Many 
aspects of life on the plantation which we should like to see in a 
day to day commonplace record are lacking, simply because to the 
writer they were commonplace. As it is, however, this is the only 
known contemporary record of an ante-bellum Texas plantation. 
There may be others—even more complete ones—in neglected family 
archives, but they are not available. One likes to believe, as in some 
respects was probably the fact, that Peach Point was a typical Texan 
slave plantation. It was self-sustaining. There was around it an 
atmosphere of culture and contentment. The negroes remained long 


THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 439 


in the family, were apparently treated with consideration, and there 
is every indication that they were comfortable and happy. 


Specimen Pages of Cotton Picking Record, 1845 


August 


Allen.... 

Bill. 

Ben. 

Bob. 

Betcey. .. 
Beckey 
Clenen. .. 
Caroline.. 
Chaney. . 
Chariot. . 
George.. . 

John. 

John Jack 
Lowey 
Mary.... 

Ned. 

Peter 

Purnell 

Robert 

Silvey. 

Westley. . . 
Sam. 


Prairie Field. . . 
Fine Cotton. . . 
Timbered Field. 


140 


292 

262 


309 

125 

219 

301 

231 


63 


289 


258 


2426 


1 13 
113 
85 

H5 
100 
110 


115 

92 


823 


107 

155 

178 

117 

118 

243 

191 

164 

173 

126 


186 

168 


140 


2066 


87 

265 

167 

97 

254 

108 

148 

219 

137 

166 

161 


145 


1940 


184 

104 

9 i 

255 


161 

215 


125 

175 

164 

77 

145 


1696 


107 

257 

200 

169 

84 

262 


151 

215 


144 

224 

182 

263 

142 


94 

93 


2597 


138 

270 

232 

170 

ii 5 

282 


165 

246 


13 


152 

221 

182 

291 

126 

86 

108 

150 


2934 


117 
248 

235 

118 

276 

180 

101 

166 

235 

176 

288 

150 

60 

25 

no 


2579 


14 


130 

290 

232 

185 

265 

64 

186 

155 

167 

221 

182 

265 

138 

90 

85 


2888 


August 

15 

16 

19 

20 

21 

22 

23 

24 

26 

Allen. 

136 

155 

150 

147 

147 

167 

165 

140 

148 

Bill. 

320 

285 

295 

331 

295 

287 

279 

280 

287 

Ran . 





185 

205 

200 

194 


Bob 

222 

24. <> 

165 


251 

255 

238 

St 

205 

268 

Betcey. 


155 

145 

138 

60 

196 

200 

205 

206 

Beckey 


133 

126 

I 5 I 

134 

160 

Clenen. 

no 

165 

200 

207 

192 

177 

160 

164 

160 

Caroline 

T07 

295 

110 


344 

301 

315 

333 

345 

Chaney. 

0 4 

147 

185 


72 

227 

208 

231 

296 

41 

Chariot. 

214 

180 

215 

195 

201 

200 

185 

235 

202 

George. 



56 

141 

159 

204 

208 

290 

285 

John. 

125 

175 

215 

198 

203 

211 

180 

200 

211 

John Jack. 

160 

160 

160 

154 

181 

167 

163 

200 

170 

Lowey. 

267 

258 

294 

319 

307 

304 

234 

233 

330 

Mary. 

207 

200 

211 

196 

200 

200 

212 

205 

220 

Ned 



210 

196 

200 

200 


222 

191 

Peter. 

312 

301 

301 

302 

355 

3 10 

315 

312 

402 

Purnell. 

157 

147 

170 

210 

205 

180 

160 

174 

190 

Robert 

5° 

45 

60 

65 

65 

60 


85 

100 

Silvey. 

98 

95 

140 

154 

160 

137 

164 

137 

130 

Westley. 

119 

123 

140 

165 

165 

154 

130 

120 

155 

Prairie Field 







3936 

4312 

4379 

Fine Cotton 




1000 

4173 

4076 

Timbered Field... 

3023 

3129 

3!86 

2105 






































































































440 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Aug.—Sept. 


Allen. 

Bill. 

Ben. 

Bob. 

Betcey. .. . 
Beckey 
Clenen... . 
Caroline... 
Chaney... 
Chariot. . . 
George 

John. 

John Jack. 
Lowey 

Mary. 

Ned. 

Peter. 

Purnell 

Robert 

Silvey. 

Westley. .. 


Prairie Field. 

Fine Cotton. 

Timbered Cotton. 


27 


162 

62 

185 

259 

195 

180 

174 

344 

200 

180 

285 

185 

185 

321 

190 

210 

359 


116 
114 
150 


4000 


28 


170 

357 

243 

328 

266 


182 
400 
255 
214 
360 
217 
230 
387 
271 

211 

407 


82 

162 

165 


5143 


29 


160 

3°o 

212 

3 12 

260 

146 

113 

352 

228 

195 

329 

222 

216 

330 
245 
218 
350 
171 
81 
137 
153 


4752 


30 


106 

245 

170 

212 

180 

130 

126 

291 

161 


235 

159 

18 

3H 

136 

176 

319 

58 

72 


130 


3397 


September 


Allen. 

Bill. 

Ben. 

Bob. 

Betcey... . 
Beckey 
Clenen 
Caroline... 
Chanen... 
Chariot. . . 
George 

John. 

John Jack. 
Lowey 

Mary. 

Ned. 

Peter. 

Purnell 

Robert 

Silvey. 

Westley. . . 


Prairie Field. .. 
Fine Cotton .. . 
Timbered Field. 


157 

285 

174 

284 

106 

326 

179 

190 

292 

200 

262 

205 

132 


326 

230 

100 

142 

161 


3831 


140 

260 

132 

182 


306 
147 
178 
264 
175 
180 
275 
1— 
212 
301 
200 
85 
142 
150 


3512 


155 

300 


235 


302 

180 

218 

267 

224 

151 

301 

204 
234 
327 

205 
90 

150 

149 


3695 


10 


148 

262 

100 

240 

147 

151 

185 


239 

205 
191 
279 
195 

88 

326 

206 
106 
137 
150 


31 


7i 

155 

95 

119 

86 

91 

79 

161 


92 

7i 

885 

165 

906 

96 

165 

59 

38 


771 


1725 


132 

267 

252 

174 


265 

84 

160 

250 

166 

149 

214 

171 


168 

75 

130 

135 


2722 


148 

249 

249 

195 

116 

274 

163 

185 

248 

192 

137 

232 

191 

279 

175 

183 

122 

148 


3386 


153 

259 

247 

178 

151 

288 

185 

182 

265 

180 

152 

222 

196 

284 

209 

100 

128 

131 


3351 


1404 

1784 


11 


176 

3H 

170 

241 

180 


191 

295 

194 

191 

( ) 
122 
90 
34i 
221 

97 

164 

175 


3610 


12 


152 

280 

243 

217 

170 

216 

125 

182 

266 

205 

191 

295 

204 

337 

212 

130 

153 


3578 


13 


157 

281 

272 

230 
171 

161 

218 

206 

278 

202 

185 

242 

231 

305 

197 

88 

150 

7i 


604 

2972 


15 


141 

254 

255 
202 


274 

194 

188 

211 

200 

165 

247 

188 

276 

175 

121 


152 

259 

232 

201 


294 

154 

151 

271 

176 

200 

249 

193 

300 

211 

no 

117 


330 i 


3092 


16 


135 

229 

238 

182 

77 


195 

181 

237 

181 

165 

251 

171 

250 

171 

113 


2712 

































































































THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 441 


Stephen S. Perry’s Journal of 1848 

The spelling, punctuation, and form of the original journal have 
been retained as nearly as possible. 

Journal Kept By Stephen S. Perry during the year 1848 


Month 

& 

Day 

Occupation 

Delinquencys 

January 

the 

16 

Gin is runing Making rails thering down and rebuild¬ 
ing fences— 

Allin Sick 

17 

Making fence, cleaning the gutters, shelling com— 
Gin runing 

Allen Sick I 

18 

Tearing down and rebuilding fences. Cut down the 
hedge in the Prairy field— Making rails Gin runing 
until nine oc at night 

Bill Sick—1 

Allen * ‘ 1 

19 

Taring down and rebuilding fences. 

Ben and Chaney 
sick 1 

Allin “ i 

20 

Taring down and rebuilding fences— 

Allin Sick i 

21 

22 

Finished rebuilding fences in the Prairy field, 

Allin Sick I 

20 

Mrs. Jack’s Tom commenced work 


22 

Making cotton bailes, (made 16,) 
carryin Cotton into gin house 

Allin sick i 

23 

Sunday— 

Allen Sick i 

24 

Weighing cotton bailes, shelling corn 

Allen sick i 

25 

Making Ben’s chimley 

Allin sick i 

26 

Finished Ben’s chimley. Commenced rebuilding fence 
in the Bottom field 

Allen sick 

Mary and Ben 
sick 

27 

Killed sixteen Hogs, cut them up and salted, part of 
the hands was occupied carrying cotton from the pens 
into the Gin Hous. Gin runing All savd and cured 

Mary and Ben 
Allen sick 

Bill half a 
day sick— 

Silvey sick 
afternoon 

28 

Killed Fifteen Hogs. Cut them up and salted part 
of the hands was ocupied carrying cotton from the 
pens into the Gin House, Gin running all savd and 
cured 

Allen sick 

29 

Shelling corn all hands continued building fence. 

Allen sick 

30 

Sunday 

Allen sick 

3i 

Taring down and rebuilding fences. Hunting sowes 
and pigs, put nine sowes with about forty young pigs 
in the Prairy field, 

Allen sick 
































442 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Month 

& 

Day 

Ocupation 

Delinquencys 

February 

the 

i 

Kill’d Sixteen hogs this morning cut them and salted, 
continue making fence, with the women 

Allen sick 

George 4 ‘ 

2 

Making fence and splitting railes Shiped to Aycock’s 
landing fifteen sacks of corn, containing 40 bushels to 
be sent to Judge Low Galveston 

George sick 

Allen sick 

3 

Making and splitting railes, continue building fence 

Alen sick 

4 

Making cotten bails, made fifteen bailes carrying 
cotton in to the Gin, 

Allen sick 

5 

Continued to bail Made seven bales, weighed, and 
shiped eleven to Mr Aycocks Landing Making fen¬ 
ce, gin stoped today 

Allen sick 

6 

Sunday 


7 

Finished building the back string of fence in the 
Bottom field Shiped eleven bailes of cotton to Mr 
Aycocks Landing 

Alen and 

Mary sick 

8 

Commenced pulling cotton stocks, and cleaning up 
the corn ground, 

Allen and 

Mary sick, 

9 

Continued to pull and roll Cotton Stocks, And Clean¬ 
ing up Corn Ground, 


9 

Ploughes commenced today, the 9. of February 


IO 

Three Ploughs running, Cleaning up cotton stocks, 


ii 

Ploughing and cleaning up ground, 


12 

Ploughing 


13 

Ploughing 


14 

Ploughing and braking down cotton stocks, 


IS 

Ploughing and braking down cotten stocks. Father 
with four of the men, has been repairing the Cotton 
press. Finished Gining today 

Becksy com¬ 
menced working 
in the field to day 
stoped working 
in the field the 7 
of February 

16 

Ploughing and braking down cotton stocks &c &c 


17 

Commenced planting corn, Continue to brake up 
land— 


l8 

Planting corn braking up land 


19 

Planting com 


20 

Sunday 


21 

Planting corn and braking up land 


22 

Planting com and Ploughing 


23 

Planting com and Ploughing 










































THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 443 


Month 

& 

Day 

Ocupation 

Delinquencys 

24 

Planting corn and Ploughing 


25 

Finished planting com this morning Braking up 
land and braking down cotten stocks 

George sick 

Silvy commenced 
work today hav¬ 
ing miss one week 

26 

Ploughing; throwing up cotten ridges in the bottom 
field, the ground is too hard to plough in the Prairy 
field, braking down cotton stocks Commence minding 
birds corn coming up 

Ben sick 

Allen sick 

27 

Sunday 


28 

Making cotton ridges braking down cotton stocks 
and minding birds 


29 

Making cotton ridges cleaning up the suger cane 
ground minding birds— 

Tom sick 

March 

1 

Braking up potatoe ground and making cotton ridges. 
Minding birds. Commenc planting cotton to day 
about twelve oc 

Tom Sick 

2 

Ploughing up potato ground and making cotton 
ridges finished cleaning up the suger ground minding 
birds com coming up very slow. 


3 

Braking up cotton ridges planting cotton, Making 
Potato hills and cleaning out ditches in the bottom 
field west of the Gin, 


4 

Making cotton ridges plowing cotton Making potato 
hills Minding birds 


5 

Sunday 


6 

Commenced Ploughing in the Prairy field, very good 
ploughing since the rain. Setting out Potato slipes 
Planting cotton in the bottom field— 

Betsy sick 
this afternoon 
George absent 
to day — 

Westly absent 
Silvy working 
in the garden 

7 

Braking up cotton ground in the Prariy field. Plant¬ 
ing Potatoes 

Silvy absent 

8 

Braking up cotton ridges in the Prairy field Cutting 
up cotton stocks. Planting Potatoes 

Silvy absent 

George absent 

9 

Braking up cotten ridges in the Prairy field Cutting 
up Cotten stocks. Commenced Planting Cotten in 
the Prairy field to day 

Silvy absent 
to day 

George absent 

10 

Finished ploughing the Prairie field and also the 
botom part, planting cotton in the Prairy part, 
finished planting sweet potatoes Minding birds 
com not all up yet— 

Clenon absent 
from the field 

Bob sick 

George absent 

11 

Commenced ploughing on the north side of the 
turn row, next to the house in the bottom field 
Planting cotten in the prairy field 

George absent 




























444 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Month 

& 

Day 

Ocupation 

Delinquencys 

12 

Sunday, no work don on Sunday 


13 

Braking up cotton land on the west side of the turn- 
row next to the house Planting cotten now Cotten 
commince comming up 


14 

Braking up cotten ridges in the Bottem field. Cotten 
coming up 


15 

Planting cotten in the bottom field on the west side 
of the tumrow. Commenced braking out the 

midles Finished making cotten ridges 


16 

Making cotten bales 

Mary Ann Sick 

17 

Finished making cotten bales the last of this years crop 
Ploughing out the middles 


i8, 19 
& 

20, 21 

Absent from home Cotton coming in the Prairy 
field 


22 

Braking out the middles in the Bottom field, Making 
a ditch the whole length of the string of fence in the 
Prairy runing East and West, cleaning out other 
Ditches, making fences in the around the paster— 

John sick 

Mary Ann 
sick 

23 

Commence ploughing corn Cleaning out ditches 

Mary Ann Sick 
John Sick 

24 

Ploughin corn, commence hoing corn to day, (we did 
not harrow our corn this year. I do not think we did 
right) We smothered down the ridges with the hoes 

Mary Ann Sick 
John Sick 

Clenon Sick 

25 

Ploughing and hoing corn 

John and Mary 
Ann Sick 

26 

Sunday 

John & Mary 

Ann Sick 

27 

Ploughing and hoing corn 

John Mary Ann 
Peter Sick 

28 

Finished Ploughing & hoing corn on the cut north of 
the Ditch 

John Peter 

Mary Ann 

Sick 

Ben 

28 

Ploughing and hoing corn sourth of the ditch. A 
very good stand of corn on both cuts 

John Peter 

Ben Mary Ann 
sick 

29 

Ploughing and hoing corn 

John Mary 

Ann Beckey 

30 

Ploughing and hoing corn Sweet-Potatoes cuming 
up. 

John Mary 

Ann & Beck¬ 
ey Tom all 
sick 

31 

Ploughing and hoing corn Commenced ploughing 
cotton 

Beckey sick 


































THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 445 


Synopsis of the months of January February and March,— 

The months of January February and March have been exceedingly favor¬ 
able to the Planters in this Latitude. Very little rain for the last four or five 
years, the Winter and fall has been noted for dryness: The sun has been 
obscured the greater part of the months of February and March. Heavy 
clouds have constantly been threatening us with a deluge, the atmosphere; in 
consequence of this and the cold winds blowing almost constant from the 
north & south also the heavy dews at night with the few refreshing showers 
that have fallen. This keeps the earth moist & mellow & in a good condition 
too moisten the seed and bringing forth vegetation. The field is in good con¬ 
dition to work, all (except the prairy part which requires heavy rains being 
very stiff land the soil will not undergo filtering like the [bottoms] on account 
of the few rains and strong winds The atmosphere has become impure which 
has produced sickness among the negroes, they complain principally of pains 
in the breast and sides—rumatisoms &c &c &c—The months of February and 
March has been practically dry. We commenced Ploughing on the ninth of 
February. The ground was in an excellent condition and broke up well, we 
had very little rain during this month not sufficient to prevent the Ploughs 
from running. On the 22 of March we finished braking up the whole planta¬ 
tion (the middles in both cotten & corn ground) the ground was in excellent 
condition. Commence planting corn on the 17 day of February. Finished 
ploughing [planting] corn on the 25 Feb. Corn up on the 26. Commenced 
Minding birds on the 26 Febr—commenced planting cotton on the, 1, of March 
Commenced planting cotten in the Prairry field on the 9 of March. Finished 
planting cotton on the 26 March Cotton up on the 14 of March. Commence 
running round the cotten with a one horse plough on the 31 of March, hoes 
commenced on the 2 of April. 

Commenced ploughing corn on the 23 of March hoing corn on the 24, of 
March, Finished hoing and ploughing on the 31. 

Planting potatoes on the seventh of March finished Planting on the 10 of 
March. Potatoes coming up on the 26 of March— 

Stephen S. Perry 


Delinquences during the months from the 17 January to the [first] of April. 



Number of days sick— 

Allen 

24 

Bill 

Day and one-halfe 

Silvey 

Sick 1 

George 

“ 3 

May Ben 

“ 4 

Ben 

“ 3 

Tom 

“ 3 

Clenen 

“ 2 

Mary Ann 

“ 11 

John 

“ 9 

Peter 

“ 2 

Bob 

“ I 

Beckey 

" 3 




446 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


[On a slip of paper attached to the last sheet of the Synopsis was the 
following:] 

Silvy absent from the field Days working at the house 


Silvey 

Days 

ii 

George absent 

4 

Becky working at the house 

14 

Wesly absent 

1 


April 

Ocupation 

Delinq 

1 

Ploughing cotten finished hoing 

Beckey absent 

2 

Sunday 


3 

Ploughing cotten and hoing cotten 

Becky Wesley 
Robert absent 

4 

Ploughing cotten and hoing cotten 

George absent 

5 

Ploughing and hoing cotten 

Mary sick 

6 

Ploughing and hoing cotten 

George absent 

7 

Ploughing and hoing cotton The corn and Cotten 
want rain Corn wants rain worse than the cotten 

George absent 

8 

Ploughin cotten and hoing cotten in the bottom field 

George absent 

9 

Sunday No working to day 


10 

Ploughing and hoing cotten Finished Ploughing 

Cotten in Bottom field. Commenced Ploughing in 
Bottom part of the Prairy field. 

Beckey absent 

11 

Ploughing and hoing cotten Cleaning out the well 
in the pasture 

Beckey Tom 

Simon absent 
from the field 

12 

Ploughing and hoing cotten finished in the Bottom 
field, hoing potatoes Finished Cleaning out the well 
in the pasture 

Tom Simon 

Doctor cleaning 
out the well 

13 

Commenced scraping Cotton in the Prairy field. 
Ploughin cotten in the Prairy field 

Beckey absent 

14 

Ploughing and hoing cotten 

Beckey absent 

IS 

Ploughing cane and hoing cotten First time the cane 
has been ploughed this year 

Beckey absent 

16 

Sundy 


17 

Finished hoing cotten, hoing and ploughing cane 
Need left this morning for Chocolet (Sam coming 
in his place) 

Beckey absent 

Ben sick 

18 

Commenced ploughing corn hilling it up and ploughing 
out the middles. Corn looks very well indeed wants 
rain very much good stand in all of it except the 
cotten ground replant not all come up 

Ben Becky 

Betsey sick 

Silvey absent 






























THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 447 


April 

Occupation 

Delinq 

19 

Ploughing corn seven ploughs runing Commenc 
hoing this morning about io Oc Robert left for 
Choclet on the 17 of April With Need carryed two 
mules with him 

Betsey Beckey 
Sick 

Silvey absent 

20 

Ploughing and hoing corn 

Betsey Beckey 
sick 

Silvey absent 

21 

Very cloudy this morning Ploughing and hoing corn 

Betsey Beckey 
sick 

Silvey absent 

22 

Ploughing and hoing corn 

Betsey Beckey 
Allin Sick 

23 

Sundy 


24 

Ploughing and hoing corn 


25 

Ploughing and hoing corn 


26 

Wednesday. Rained from 10 oc AM to one. Wet 
the ploughed ground about 2 inches. 


27 

Thursday, fair (finished hoing corn 3 o’clock P.M.) 


28 

Friday—Cloudy in the morning fair prospect for Rain 
Rained in the night hard 


29 

Saturday. Set out Sweet Potato Sprouts with 8 hands. 

1 Hand Cooking old Sarah Sick 

2 Hands Hailing wood 

2 hands Grinding in the afternoon driving up Cows 
& Calves 

3 Hands work on the Road between Crosbys and 
Brazoria by order of Majr. J. P. Caldwell overseer 


May 

1 

Monday May 1st. 4 ploughs started again in Cotten 
plowing Cotten on the cut N.E. of Gin 12 Hoe Hands 
finished seting out potatoes before Breckfast, and 
went to replanting Cotten in the Prairie field—at 
least one third missing 


2 

Tuesday 2 11 Hands finished Replanting Cotten in 

prairie field againt Breckfast and went to Hoeing 
Cotten in the Cut N.E. of Gin—1 Hand Bob with 
Caraige to Canney 


3 

Wednesday 3 

Ploughing Cotten with the shovl plogh and 
runing around with a one horse plough, hoing 
cotten cutting the Cotton out to a stand 
Ploughed the potatoes 


4 

Thursday 4 

Finished ploughing with the shovel plough to 
day in the bottom field. Commenced with the 
two shovel. Ploughes in the Prairy field. 
Ploughing with one horse plough. Cutting the 
Cotten out to a stand fine prospects for a good 
crop of cotten. corn tassoling 


5 

Friday 5 Ploughing Cane and Cotten Finished 
ploughing cane to day 




























448 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


May 

6 

7 

8 

9 


io 


ii 


12 

13 

14 

15 


16 

17 

18 


19 

20 


21 

22 


23 


24 


25 


26 


Ocupation 

Delinquences 

Ploughing Cotten in the Prairy field hoing cotten 
out to a stand in the bottom field 


Sunday 


Ploughing cotten in the Prairy field Commenc Cut¬ 
ting the Cotten out to a stand in the Prairy field 

Mary sick 

Ploughing and hoing cotten in the Prairy field Cotten 
coming up in the prairy part since the rain in the hard 
places think that I will get a tollerable good stand 

Mary sick 

Finished Ploughing in the Prairy field to day. Com¬ 
menc ploughing out the middles with the sweeps on 
that Cut next to the Corn on the south side of the gin, 
hoing the cotten out to a stand in the prairy field 

May & Bill 

Sick 

Ploughing cotten Finished hoing cotten in the prairy 
field. Commen hoing that Cut South of the Gin 
next to the Com— 


Ploughing com, Commenc hoing corn to day 


Sunday 


Ploughing and hoing Corn 

Wesly Sick 

Ploughing corn on the north side of the ditch, hoing 
Corn on the South side of the ditch 

Wesly Sick 

Ploughing and hoin corn 

Wesly Sick 

Ploughing and hoing corn 

Wesly Sick 

Finished Ploughing the Corn to day about 12 o.c 
Commenc braking out the Cotten Ground 

Wesly Sick 

hoing corn and Ploughing cotten 

Wesly Sick 

hoing Corn and Ploughing Cotten on the West side 
of the gin 

Wesly Sick 

Sunday 


Houing corn part of the day, commenc hoing potatoes 
about nine Oc Ploughing Cotten, on the west side of 
the gin, 

Ben sick 

Bill sick 

Wesly sick 

Hoing Potatoes and ploughing Cotten on the West 
side of the gin 

Ben sick 

Wesley sick 

Ploughing cotten and hoing Potatoes until (nine) of 
(ten Oc) Making potatoe ridges in the com 

Tom sick 

Wesly sick 

Finished running around the Cotten on the north 
eist side of the gin hoing Cotten on the North east 
side of the gin 

Tom sick 

Wesly sick 

Ploughing cotten in the Prairy field hoing cotten on 
the east side of the gin 

Wesly sick 

Finished Ploughing the Cotten in the bottom part of 
the Prairy field—hoing Cotten on the east side of the 
Gin north of the midle turn row and south of the 
Potatoe patch Killed a beef this morning 



27 











































THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 449 


May 

Ocupation 

Delinquences 

28 

Sunday 


29 

Ploughing cotten on the south east side of the gin 
north of the turn row hoing cotten there also (Cotten 
boles Cottin boles) 


30 

Finished Ploughing the cut on the south side of the 
gine and north of the turnrow Commenc ploughing out 
the midles on the other side of the turnow 

Tom ran off 

3 i 

Ploughing out the middles on the same side of the turn. 
row, Howing corn 

Tom run off 


Absent from home untill the seventh of June 

Tom run off 

Month 

of 

June 

7 

Ploughing cotten in the Prairy field, runing out the 
middles, hoing cotten, Ploughing cane with a double 
horse Plough— 

Tom come in 

8 

Finished Ploughing and hoing the Prairy cottin to 
day about Twelve and one Oc Ploughing the slip 
potatoes also hoing the Potatoes, Commenc braking 
out the midles in the bottom field on the north side of 
the gin to the right of the middle turn row, 


9 

having rained all night was too wet to hoe the potatoes 
or plough Cotten, spent part of the day hoing cane 
having rained halfe of the day assorting the corn 
from the shucks and shelling com to grind 


10 

Plough hands hoing cane until breakfast time, they 
then cut wood untill dinner time Doctor and Allen 
hailing wood & cotten Bill’s gang hoing cane all day. 
Ploughs commenc runing after dinner, 


11 

Sunday 


12 

Commenc ploughing out the midles north of the slue 
and on the right of the gin next to the com hoing 
potatoes 


13 

Finished Ploughing the cut of cotten on the right of 
the gine and north of the slue Ploughing the cut 
south of the gin and on the left of the turnrow going 
down Finished hoing potatoes and Commenc hoing 
the cotten following the Ploughs, Fine cotten nearly 
as high as my hand Bold hoed out the turnrow and as 
fare down as the gin 

Becky sick 

14 

Ploughs stoped on account of the rain hands have 
been employed a variety of ways some carrying shuck 
some getting board timber and some hoing down the 
the large weeds in the fields Cleaned the ridge where 
the Bo dark is planted 


15 

Four hands getting board timber Three of the hand 
gon halfe of the day after basket timber, Clenen and 
Allen hailing board timber the other halfe Bob with 
John and Simon was together with Bill’s gang hoing 
cotten very wet hoing 

Carlin sick 

16 

Commenc ploughing this morning six ploughs runing 
and two sweeps Finished hoing the Cotten cut next 
to the corn and north of the slue 

Carolin sick 






























450 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


June 

Ocupation 

Delinquences 

17 

Ploughing cotten hoing cotten south of the slew and 
next to the corn—Wesly has a sore shine which is 
nearly well, we have been doctering him by applying 
a plaster of fresh cow menure which is very good— 


18 

Sunday Sunday 


19 

Ploughing and hoing cotten south of the gine hoing on 
the right hand side of the turnrow Ploughing on the 
other side— 

John sick this 
morning 

20 

Finished Ploughing out the midles today about (—) 
Oc. I have Ploughed out all the middles on the 
Plantation all hands hoing the cut on the south side 
of the gin and west of the turnrow. Two sweeps 
runing on the cut West of the gin and South of the 
ditch 


21 

Two sweps runing, all the rest of the hand hoing excep 
Ben who is making bords 


22 

Two sweeps runing so the rest of the hands are hoing 
cotten, having finished that cut south and west of the 
gin, Commenced hoing on the west side and of the 
gin and north of the slue, 


23 

Two swep runing after two Ploughs hoing cotten and 
Ben is making boards, Droped the sweep today about 

12 Oc 


24 

Droped the sweeps and commenced ploughing again, 
finished this cut to day about 12 Oc hoing cotten with 
the remainder of the hands in this same cut, 


25 

Sunday 


26 

Commencd ploughing out the middles in the cut south 
of the slew next to the corn and on the east side of the 
gin Hoing the cut north of the slew and east of the 
gin. Three sweeps runing in the Prairy field 


27 

Three sweeps runing in the prairy field Sam, Tom, and 
Bob Finished hoing cotten Wednesday the 26 hoed 
out the turnrow hoing potatoes in the corn cutting 
,down the weeds in the corn 


28 

Sweep runing, Cutting down weeds in the corn 


30 

Sweeps running in the Prairy field, Cutting out the 
weeds in the Prairy field— 


August 

the 

17 

Picking cotten in the Bottom field Commenced yester¬ 
day on the cut south of the gin and east of the turn- 
row 


19 

All hands commenc picking cotten to day the first 
fair day we have had since I have commenced] 
picking— 

Georg sick 

October 
the 11, 
1848 

Stoped picking cotten We have picked, 154188 


Novem¬ 

ber 

1 

We had a light frost the first this year. 





























THE HISTORY OF A TEXAS SLAVE PLANTATION 451 



Ocupation 

Delinquences 

Novem¬ 
ber the, 
4 . 

Novem¬ 

ber 

the 

5 

Novem¬ 
ber 
the 6 

Nov 

the 

Novem¬ 

ber 

the 2i, 
1848 

Novem¬ 

ber 

the 

24, 

We had frost quite heavy 


Very heavy frost the suger cane was Killed on 
the fourth of November commenced cutting cane on 
the 4 of November 


Frost not quite so heavy as .the night before cane 
all killed. 


Finished cutting cane 


Finished diging potatoes The Potatoes turned out 
very well this year— 


The gin commenced running— 


















CHAPTER XXXIV 

THE SECESSION MOVEMENT IN TEXAS 

By Charles W. Ramsdell 

[This selection constitutes the introductory chapter of Professor Rams- 
dell’s Reconstruction in Texas (Columbia University Press, New York, 1916). 
It is a brief survey of the rise of the secession movement in Texas, the most 
important topic in the history of the State during the first fifteen years follow¬ 
ing annexation. For more detailed treatment see the two articles by Anna 
Irene Sandbo (pages 459-485). Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapters XXII, XXIII; 
Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 203-213.] 

For nearly a decade after the annexation of Texas to the Union 
the questions uppermost in the public mind of the state were the 
local issues growing out of the days of the Revolution and the 
Republic. The heavy state debt, the ravaged frontier, and the 
boundary dispute determined the complexion of the party plat¬ 
forms and measures and furnished the staple subjects of political 
discussion. Issues of national policies held second place until after 
the Compromise of 1850, which settled the boundary question, and 
at the same time provided the means of paying off the state debt. 
The protection of the frontier was to be a problem for twenty-five 
years more. 

Gradually, the questions involved in the great dispute over slavery 
forced themselves upon the immediate attention of the people of Texas. 
Slavery had existed in the state ever since the Anglo-Americans had 
first pushed their way into the wilderness; and climatic conditions, 
agricultural development, and constant immigration from the older 
southern states had contributed to the spread of the institution. It 
had rooted itself most firmly in the populous eastern and southeastern 
counties, along the Sabine, Trinity, Brazos, and Colorado rivers, where 
the plantation system was in almost exclusive possession of the coun¬ 
try and conditions, social and economic, were practically identical 
with those existing in the older slave states. In the other regions 
there were fewer slaves and correspondingly more free labor. The 
northern counties contained a large number of settlers from Illinois, 
Indiana, and Kentucky who were mostly non-slaveholding; the frontier 
counties, running south through the middle of the state, had only a 
small proportion of slaves, and the southwest, with a heavy German 
population, had fewer still. However, in these districts, except, pos- 

452 


THE SECESSION MOVEMENT IN TEXAS 


453 


sibly, the last—for the Germans were still segregated and unfamiliar 
with the institution—the absence of slaves argued no hostility to the 
ownership of human chattels, but simple inability to own them. Texas 
was still a new country, half covered with savages, and most of the 
people were poor after the manner of pioneers. Standing between 
the old South and the new West, partaking of the character of both, 
every year of slavery saw her drawn closer to the former; and it 
was inevitable that she should soon find herself in the political cur¬ 
rent setting so strongly toward secession. 

It was the fight over the Kansas-Nebraska Bill that filst drew 
Texas into the arena of national politics. Sam Houston, then United 
States Senator, opposed the bill and lost much of his popularity 
thereby; for most of the voters and political leaders were state-rights 
Democrats. Nevertheless, he was backed by a strong following of 
independent Democrats, old line Whigs, Know-Nothings, and others 
who deprecated agitation of the slavery question as dangerous to the 
peace and permanence of the Union. The feeling aroused in the con¬ 
test over Douglas’s bill was intensified by the quarrels over the Fugi¬ 
tive Slave Law and particularly by the outbreak of the border war 
in Kansas. In 1857, after an exciting canvass, Houston was defeated 
for the governorship by H. R. Runnels, the Democratic nominee and 
an extreme state-rights man. However, Texas had not yet given per¬ 
manent adhesion to extreme measures and the strong conservative 
element became alarmed at the disquieting utterances of some of the 
radical Democrats, who were now advocating the purchase of Cuba, 
the promotion of filibustering in Central America, and the reopening 
of the African slave trade. These propositions were never popular in 
Texas and the Democratic organization never championed them; but 
because of a few inconsiderate and hot-headed leaders, the party fell 
under suspicion, and in 1859 conservatism was able to administer a 
severe rebuke by reversing the decision of two years before. Run¬ 
nels and Lubbock, again the Democratic nominees for the chief state 
offices were defeated by Houston and Clark, and T. N. Waul, Dem¬ 
ocratic candidate for Congress from the western district, was beaten 
by A. J. Hamilton, who ran on the Houston or Independent ticket. 
In the eastern district, John H. Reagan, Democrat, was successful. 

In October, John Brown made his raid on Harper’s Ferry. The 
effect in Texas was to neutralize the results of the recent conserva¬ 
tive victory, and to place the fire-eating section of the Democarcy in 
the ascendancy. When the legislature met in November it elected to 
a vacancy in the United States Senate, Louis T. Wigfall, the most 
rabid state-rights man in Texas and one particularly obnoxious to 
Houston. The course of the debates in Congress and the speeches 
of Republican leaders were followed with the liveliest apprehensions, 
and talk of secession as the only way to safety from abolitionist ag¬ 
gression became common. In the national Democratic convention at 


454 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Charleston in April, i860, the Texas delegates bolted along with 
those from the other southern states, and at Baltimore helped nomi¬ 
nate the ticket headed by Breckenridge and Lane. The situation was 
far beyond the control of Governor Houston, but he made tremendous 
efforts to still the rising storm. Under his leadership the Unionists 
gathered to the support of Bell and Everett, in the vain hope that 
evasion of the great issue would bring peace. When the state-rights 
extremists declared that the election of the “Black Republican’’ candi¬ 
date, Lincoln, would be a declaration of war upon the South and 
would necessitate secession, he denounced them as traitors, and in¬ 
sisted that secession was an unconstitutional and revolutionary meas¬ 
ure, and could be justified only after the federal government should 
begin aggressions upon the slave states. Until that time should come, 
he pleaded for caution and for confidence in the government. 

When the result of the election was positively known, the seces¬ 
sionist leaders determined to act. In nearly all parts of the state 
mass-meetings were held and resolutions passed, requesting the gov¬ 
ernor to assemble the legislature at once in extra session in order that 
it might provide for a convention to act for the state in the emergency. 
In most cases it was clearly intended by the agitators that the con¬ 
vention should frame and pass an ordinance of secession; but there 
were some who wished it to go no further at first than to appoint 
delegates to consult with the other slave states and seek from the free 
states a renewal of the constitutional guarantees of property in slaves. 
The plan for a state convention was checked for a time by the refusal 
of Governor Houston to convoke the legislature; and despite a flood 
of letters, editorials, and resolutions conveying entreaties and threats, 
he held firm. But the men with whom he had to deal were as deter¬ 
mined as he, and if they could not secure the convention in a regular 
way they would have it in another. On December 3, i860, a group 
of secession leaders at Austin drew up an address “to the people of 
Texas” suggesting that the voters of each representative district hold 
an election on January 8th, under the order of the chief justice of 
the district or of one or more of the county commissioners or at the 
call of a committee of responsible citizens, vote for twice as many 
delegates as the district had representatives in the legislature, and make 
returns of the election to the persons ordering it. The delegates were 
to meet in Austin on January 28, 1861. Extra-legal and revolutionary 
as the plan was, it won the endorsement of the secessionists every¬ 
where, and by its very audacity at once gave them a great advantage 
over the Unionists, whose defensive and negative opposition only 
assured the election of secessionist delegates. 

Outflanked, Houston now called the legislature to meet one week 
before the convention. Soon afterward came the news that South 
Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi were already 
out of the Union. Not all of the counties held elections for the 


THE SECESSION MOVEMENT IN TEXAS 


455 


convention—for some districts were too strongly Unionist and others 
lacked organization—but of the delegates elected nearly all were seces¬ 
sionists. To the objection that it was an assemblage without authority 
under the law, the followers of Houston now added another—that it 
represented only a minority of the people. When the legislature met 
the governor sent in a message in which he still insisted that the rights 
of the people could best be maintained in the Union, advised against 
hasty action, and intimated that the approaching convention was an 
illegal body. The legislature, however, displayed little sympathy with 
his views, and passed a resolution recognizing the full authority of 
the convention to act for the people, except that its action upon the 
question of secession should be submitted to a vote of the people. 

The convention met on January 28th, as arranged. Associate 
Justice O. M. Roberts, one of the authors of the call, was elected 
president; a committee was appointed to wait upon the governor, and 
another to draft an ordinance of secession. The first found Governor 
Houston willing to concede the authority to secure “an expression of 
the popular will,” because of the action of the legislature, but reserved 
as to other powers. The second committee reported an ordinance 
setting forth the reasons for secession, namely, that the Federal gov¬ 
ernment had failed to give protection to the persons and property of 
citizens of Texas upon the frontier, that the northern states had 
violated the compact between the states and the guarantees of the 
constitution, and that the power of the Federal government was now 
sought as a weapon to strike down the interests and prosperity of the 
people of Texas and of her sister slave-holding states. It was, there¬ 
fore, declared that the ordinance of annexation of 1845 was repealed 
and annulled; that all the powers which had been delegated by Texas 
to the Federal government were revoked and resumed; that Texas 
was of right absolved from all restraints and obligations incurred by 
the Federal compact, and was a separate sovereign state; and that 
all her people were absolved from allegiance to the United States. 
The ordinance was to be submitted to the people for ratification or 
rejection on February 23d, and, if carried by a majority of the votes 
cast, should take effect March 2, 1861. A resolution was offered to 
strike out the clause submitting the ordinance to a popular vote, but 
it was voted down. On February 1st, in the presence of crowded 
galleries and hall and a number of invited guests, including the gover¬ 
nor, the vote was taken and the ordinance passed overwhelmingly, 
166 to 7. Among those voting “no” was J. W. Throckmorton, of 
Collin, afterwards reconstruction governor. 

The convention did not stop here, but took it upon itself to trans¬ 
act a vast amount of business not even hinted at in the call under 
which its delegates were elected. Commissioners from the other se¬ 
ceded states were present urging participation in the general govern¬ 
ment being organized at Montgomery, Alabama; and the convention, 


456 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


anticipating the popular adoption of the secession ordinance, elected 
seven delegates to Montgomery. 1 At the same time the senators and 
representatives at Washington were informed of the action of the 
convention. A “committee of public safety” of nineteen members 
was appointed and endowed with extensive powers for the defense 
of the state. Among other things it was authorized to remain in ses¬ 
sion during recess, to appoint officers and commissioners to carry out 
its plans, and to keep its operations secret. On February 5th the 
convention adjourned until March 2d. 

One of the first projects of the committee of public safety was 
to secure the munitions of war in the possession of the United States 
troops in western Texas. These troops, about 2,500 in number, were 
commanded by Major-General D. E. Twiggs, with headquarters at 
San Antonio. He was a Georgian and his sympathies were with the 
South; and it may be said in partial extenuation of his later action, 
that since the middle of December he had been incessantly appealing 
to Washington to know what he should do in case Texas seceded, 
and had received no instruction in reply. The committee waited upon 
Governor Houston and secured his approval of their designs, and then 
opened negotiations with Twiggs on February 9th for a surrender of 
the federal stores on March 2d. The negotiations had not been con¬ 
cluded when on the 15th it was learned that General Twiggs had been 
relieved by Colonel Waite, who was not expected to be so compliant. 
Waite had not yet arrived, however, and during that night a large 
body of state troops under the command of Ben McCulloch were 
rushed into San Antonio and placed at points of vantage. Nothing 
but surrender of the stores would avoid a conflict now, and terms 
were agreed upon two days later. The troops were allowed to retain 
their arms, the light batteries and sufficient supplies and equipment 
for transportation to the coast, where they were to embark for the 
North. Waite arrived next day, too late for anything but acquies¬ 
cence in the terms. Twiggs was dismissed from the United States 
Army for “treachery to the flag of his country,” and was eulogized 
by resolution of the Texas legislature as a “pure patriot.” His sur¬ 
render was undoubtedly “a military necessity” at the time it occurred, 
but he might have forestalled it had he chosen to act in time, con¬ 
centrate his forces and retreat, if necessary, to New Mexico. 

In the meantime other state troops under Colonel Henry McCul¬ 
loch had received the surrender of the small federal posts north of 
San Antonio; and Colonel John S. Ford, with a third party, had done 
the same for the lower Rio Grande valley and the adjacent coast 
region. 

While these events were taking place, the campaign for the rati- 

1 The delegates were Senators Louis T. Wigfall and John Hemphill, with 
John H. Reagan, John Gregg, W. S. Oldham, Wm. B. Ochiltree and T. N 
Waul. 


THE SECESSION MOVEMENT IN TEXAS 


457 


fication of the secession ordinance was closing. The authors of the 
measure were determined that it should not be defeated; the Union¬ 
ists, unorganized, were making a last desperate stand. It was a time 
of wild excitement; intimidation and violence too often replaced 
argument. Charges of unfair tactics and of fraud came up from all 
parts of the state against the secessionists, who controlled for the 
most part the machinery of election. There are scores of persons 
living to-day who insist that the majority of the people were opposed 
to secession, but that enough were kept from the polls by intimidation 
to determine the result. That is hardly probable; but what the result 
would have been, if the election could have been carried through in 
a quiet spirit, cannot be said with absolute certainty. However, when 
the convention came together again on March 2d, the returns showed 
44,317 for the ordinance to 13,020 against it. 

Governor Houston regarded the work of the convention as fin¬ 
ished; the people, he argued, should be allowed to call another con¬ 
vention if other important work was to be done. But the members 
had no intention of giving way, and regarded the vote for secession 
as a sufficient endorsement of their actions to warrant them in doing 
more. Accordingly the convention, when reassembled, formally ap¬ 
proved the provisional constitution of the Confederacy, gave official 
character to the delegates representing the interests of Texas at Mont¬ 
gomery, and urged them to secure the admission of Texas to the new 
Union. Houston had acquiesced in secession, but to this later action 
he was bitterly opposed, regarding it as wholly unauthorized by the 
people and an arrant usurpation of power. He refused to recognize 
the convention any longer. • It replied by a declaration that it not only 
had power to pass and submit the ordinance of secession, but also 
possessed and would exercise the right to do whatever might be in¬ 
cidental to the same, and necessary for the protection of the people 
and the defense of the state. In pursuance of the supreme powers 
thus asserted, the convention next proceeded so to modify the state 
constitution that it should conform to the constitution of the Con¬ 
federacy—for the Texas delegates had now been admitted to the pro¬ 
visional Congress. Among other things the convention prescribed 
an oath of office professing allegiance to the Confederacy, and ordered 
that all state officers must take this oath or vacate their offices. When 
notified, all responded except Governor Houston and his secretary 
of state, E. W. Cave, the former replying orally that he did not recog¬ 
nize the existence of the convention. It was known that the removal 
of the governor was imminent, and an indignation meeting of the 
numerous Unionists in the vicinity of Austin was held at which 
Houston and A. J. Hamilton, who had just returned from Congress, 
made speeches denouncing the course of the convention. On the 
same day, March 16th, the office of governor was declared vacant 
and the lieutenant-governor, Edward Clark, was instructed to take up 


458 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


its duties. Upon retiring, the venerable governor issued, as an address 
to the people, a spirited but dignified protest against the “usurpations” 
of the convention. He made no further resistance and soon retired 
from public life, to die two years later. An effort of the Unionists 
in the legislature to repudiate the deposition of the governor was de¬ 
feated, and the members themselves were required^to take the oath. 
On March 23d the Constitution of the Confederacy was formally rat¬ 
ified and ijs authority extended over Texas. Three days later the 
convention adjourned sine die , leaving the reorganized state govern¬ 
ment to resume its wonted authority. 


CHAPTER XXXV 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 
IN TEXAS 

By Anna Irene Sandbo 

[Unfortunately this very excellent study of the growth of secession senti¬ 
ment in Texas has to be abbreviated. The study begins with a brief sketch of 
the development of slavery in the United States and of the beginning of slavery 
in Texas. Section II of the article describes the indifference of the Texans 
before 1854 to the slavery controversy that was rending the United States. 
Section III takes up the rise of the secession movement in Texas after 1854, 
treating the subject under the following topics: (1) The Beginning of Political 
Parties in Texas; (2) Houston Censured for Vote on the Kansas-Nebraska 
Bill; (3) The Gubernatorial Campaign of 1857; (4) The First Threats of 
Secession; (5) The Question of Re-opening the African Slave Trade. All 
these topics are omitted. This selection begins with the sixth topic under Sec¬ 
tion III—namely, the Gubernatorial Campaign of 1859. The complete study is 
published in The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, XVIII, 41-73. 162-194. 
For a phase of the secession movement in Texas not covered by this section 
see: Ramsdell, “The Frontier and Secession,” in Studies in Southern History 
and Politics (Columbia University Press, New York, 1914). Read: Garrison, 
Texas, Chapter XXIII; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of 
Texas, Chapter IX.] 


The Gubernatorial Campaign of 1859 

The issue in the gubernatorial election of 1859, so ^ ar at ^ east as 
the leaders were concerned, was “union” or “disunion.” The plat¬ 
form adopted by the Regular Democrats at Houston endorsed all the 
old planks in both the national and state platforms, and then declared 
the Dred Scott decision to be a true exposition of the constitution, 
and that the Democrats were in favor of the acquisition of Cuba as 
imperatively necessary to their self protection. A resolution favoring 
the reopening of the slave trade was, after much heated discussion, 
tabled by a vote of two hundred twenty-eight to eighty-one, and a 
resolution condemning the same measure was tabled unanimously. 
Runnels and Lubbock, exponents of the pro-slavery and anti-union 
doctrine, were nominated for their respective positions. 

It seems that the Unionist forces had no definite organization. 
But at a public meeting at Brenham, Houston and Edward Clark were 
nominated by acclamation. Houston accepted the nomination in a 
letter in which he declared himself a National Democrat and an- 

459 


460 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


nounced that the Constitution and the Union embraced the principles 
by which he would be governed if elected. He declared that they 
comprehended all the old Jackson National Democracy he had ever 
professed. In it he promised protection to the frontier, protested 
against the reopening of the African slave trade, extolled the federal 
union, denounced his opponents and appealed with great effect to his 
old comrades of 1836. 

The campaign that followed was very bitter. Against Houston 
were arrayed the whole party machinery, most of the prominent public 
men and nearly all of the influential newspapers. Houston was again 
subjected to all the abuse that had been heaped upon him in the former 
canvass. Because of his votes in the Senate on the slavery measures, 
and because of his attitude toward the New England ministers, he 
was accused of betraying the state and the South to further his 
ambition to attain the presidency. 

Houston conceived the entire system of conventions to be incon¬ 
sistent with Democratic principles and subversive of the rights of the 
people. This attitude toward the framework of the state rights 
party which was believed to be the only bulwark between the people 
and northern aggression as well as his affiliation with the Know-Noth¬ 
ing party was made the occasion for abusive articles by the opposition 
press. Old charges of insincerity, immorality, and cowardice from the 
days of the Texas revolution were reopened, emphasized, and spread 
broadcast throughout the state. 

Houston and his adherents, in their turn, accused the Democratic 
leaders of disunion and treason and of advocating the reopening of 
the slave trade. Governor Runnels’s frontier policy was attacked with 
great vigor, for both the Indians and Mexicans were very trouble¬ 
some, and Runnels had not been able to keep them in check. That the 
reason for such a state of affairs, was probably more the fault of the 
United States government than of the governor, the people did not 
see. Houston had been fairly successful in his dealings with the In¬ 
dians when he was at the helm of state affairs, and this fact no 
doubt, as well as his great personal popularity with the common people, 
played an important part in his overwhelming victory at the polls in 
1859. 

Houston announced his candidacy in nearly all the anti-Democratic 
papers as follows: 

“Announce Sam Houston as a National Democrat, a consistent 
supporter of James Buchanan in his struggle with Black Republicans, 
and the little less dangerous Fanatics and Higher Law men at the 
South, as candidate for Governor.” During the whole bitter con¬ 
troversy and everywhere he went, Houston made eloquent appeals for 
the preservation of the Union. 

That the struggle was a fight principally between the lovers of the 
Union and those who wished to secede, was also shown in the posi- 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 461 


tion John H. Reagan assumed toward the movement, and by the 
abuse he received in consequence, as well as by the fact that the Demo¬ 
cratic nominees were placed on the defensive in the campaign. Reagan 
was forced by Guy M. Bryan to give in Congress his views of the 
situation. Reagan declared himself against sectionalism, the demoral¬ 
izing doctrines of filibusters, and the dangerous heresy of reopening 
the slave trade. As soon as the contents of this speech became known 
in Texas, the Democratic press charged him with being too national 
for a proper representative of a Southern constituency, and heaped 
upon him vile personal abuse. As a result of this he decided to 
stand for re-election, went to Texas, and was re-elected by a large 
majority over his opponent, William B. Ochiltree. 1 

The Texas Enquirer upheld the Democratic party against the 
Southern Intelligencer's accusation that the party favored secession. 
It maintained that no word had been spoken by any man of any 
prominence in the state connected with the Democratic party about 
secession as a probable event, or as anything likely to occur, at least 
not unless the same should be forced upon the South as a choice 
between remaining in the Union with positive disgrace on the one 
hand, and of going out of it on the other hand. 

Lubbock also was forced to defend his position on the subject 
of the slave trade. In an open letter to the editor of the Galveston 
Union, he stated that he had been renominated by a convention that 
had emphatically rejected a resolution in favor of reopening the slave 
trade. In an open letter to the chairman of the state executive com¬ 
mittee, endorsing Lubbock’s letter Governor Runnels says: “I am 
now, as I have ever been, for the Union under the constitution and 
the strict maintenance of the supremacy of the laws; and I do not 
consider that there is any cause for a dissolution of the Union at this 
time.” 

It seems that the primary object of the Democratic leaders at this 
time was to preserve their rights in the Union if they could; but at the 
same time they were preparing the minds of the people for the idea 
of withdrawing from the Union should a situation arise in which 
these rights would be threatened. That such might be the case in 
the near future, it took no seer to discern. The final crisis seemed 
to depend upon the presidential election the following year. 

Houston had always been a state rights man, and although he 
himself upheld the federal doctrine that secession meant revolution, 
both he and his adherents firmly believed that it was a matter of 
expediency to remain in the Union, that the rights of the state could 

1 Reagan says in his Memoirs, page 71, that the Texas newspapers were so 
full of abuse that he was forced to burn the papers that reached him to keep 
his wife from seeing them. Being in doubt whether he should stand for re- 
election and wishing to know his wife’s views on the subject, he finally let her 
see the papers and explained to her the reason for such an unwarranted attack. 
She immediately advised him to return to Texas and stand for re-election. 


462 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


be better preserved in the Union than out of it. The Democrats, on 
the other hand, held that the state had a right to secede, and that 
to secede would probably soon be a wise course to pursue. The out¬ 
come of the election was a decisive defeat for the party which had 
controlled the affairs of the state since 1845, as far as congressional 
representation and the governorship were concerned. But this did 
not necessarily imply that the sentiment of Unionism had triumphed 
in Texas. As has already been stated, there were other factors that 
played an important part in the election. And the Democratic party 
had by no means been defeated, for the Democrats still controlled 
both houses of the legislature. 

What Union sentiment there was in Texas in 1859 received a 
rude shock in the John Brown raid at Harper's Ferry. This was 
fully believed to be a premeditated attack by Northern abolitionists 
upon the institutions of the South; and the result was soon seen in 
Texas. Louis T. Wigfall, one of the most radical men in the state, 
and Houston’s most bitter opponent, was elected to the United States 
Senate just before Houston’s inauguration. According to one leader 
the election was due to the resentment against the Harper’s Ferry 
outrage, and there are indications that this opinion was shared by 
many. To elect him, however, a party caucus was necessary. Since 
Wigfall at the time was a member of the state senate, it also became 
necessary to reinterpret a clause in the state constitution referring to 
the ineligibility of a member of the legislature to any other office. 

Immediately after his election, Senator Wigfall addressed the 
legislature on the all-absorbing question of the day. In his opinion 
Congress had no right under the power to regulate commerce to de¬ 
clare any branch of trade piracy. He reprehended the attempt he 
had seen to read Democrats out of the Democratic party because they 
held opinions favorable to the reopening of the slave trade. He de¬ 
nied the right of Congress on principle to prohibit either the foreign 
slave trade or the slave trade between the states, and as for himself, 
he was a Southern rights man, a state rights man, and a Democrat. 
This speech was highly commended as representing the views of the 
regular Democrats. 

Governor Runnels in his last message to the legislature also pro¬ 
claimed the views of the party and foreshadowed the final result of 
the movement now fully inaugurated by the leaders of the secession 
movement. He upheld the doctrine of state sovereignty, and doubted 
very much that the general government would be able to uphold and 
protect the rights of the South. He thought that as soon as it should 
become evident that the United States could not do so, the only thing 
for the Southern States to do would be to cooperate in protecting 
themselves. In conclusion he said: 

If there can be no longer unity and harmony of sentiment, if the Southern 
people are no longer to look to it [the federal government] as the chief reli- 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 463 


ance for the maintenance of their equal rights, their internal peace and security, 
the sooner it is known the better. They should neither cheat, nor should they 
submit to be cheated. I therefore recommend a clear and unequivocal expres¬ 
sion of opinion by the legislature on the subject. Equality and security in the 
Union, or independence outside of it should be the devout conviction, that if 
guided by wisdom, prudence, sagacity and patriotism, the Divine Being will 
smile on your councils, and that all may yet be well. 

Governor Houston soon learned that his task would be an ex¬ 
tremely difficult one. All the criticism, disparagement, and party 
animosity exhibited by the Democratic party during the campaign con¬ 
tinued. He had learned before he entered upon his duties as Governor 
that the legislature was hostile, and he was soon to learn that the 
Democratic leaders were determined that the state should withdraw 
from the Union, no matter what action he took to prevent it. 

Houston at his inauguration confined the greater part of his speech 
to local affairs. In regard to the slavery controversy he said he hoped 
that the federal government would soon attain a happy result in pre¬ 
serving the Constitution and the Union, notwithstanding the present 
discord between the two sections. He then strongly advised against 
heated controversies that would only aggravate the evil. 

In his first message he was very conciliatory. He was glad that 
the masses in the North were willing to abide by the Constitution and 
put down the fanatical efforts of the abolitionists who were endanger¬ 
ing the safety of the Union. He hoped their efforts would terminate 
the slavery agitation. And in conclusion he declared that the people, 

satisfied that the men whom they elected at the ballot box to represent them 
in Congress will bear their rights safely through the present crisis, they feel 
no alarm as to the result. Texas will maintain the constitution and stand by 
the Union. It is all that can save us as a nation. Destroy it and anarchy 
awaits us. 

The Legislature on the South Carolina Resolutions 

Soon after this Houston received the South Carolina resolutions 
on federal relations. These expressed the sentiment of South Car¬ 
olina on the loss of Kansas to slavery and on the Virginia raid by 
John Brown. In the preamble the right of secession was affirmed. 
The resolutions recommended immediate and united action by the 
Southern states, and requested them to appoint deputies and adopt 
measures to promote a Southern convention. 

On the receipt of these resolutions, Governor Houston sent them, 
together with a special message, to the legislature. The whole mes¬ 
sage was devoted to the exposure of the fallacy of the doctrines of 
nullification and secession. He maintained that the action of South 
Carolina was without just cause; that even if there were no consti¬ 
tutional objections to the course suggested by the resolutions, no 
advantages could be gained by the Southern states in seceding from the 


464 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Union; that the same evils would remain, and there would be no 
federal government, able and willing, to maintain the rights of the 
state; that the ungenerous assaults by the North upon slavery would 
exist from like passions and like feelings under any form of govern¬ 
ment; that the only hope for the country was in the Constitution and 
the Union; and he made a passionate plea for these against the fanatics 
in the North and the scheming, designing, and misguided politicians 
in the South. He recommended that resolutions be adopted dissent¬ 
ing from the assertion of the abstract right of secession and refusing 
to send delegates for any existing cause, and finally urged upon all 
the people, North and South, the necessity of cultivating brotherly 
feeling, observing justice and attending to their own affairs. 

Although no final action was taken by the legislature upon the 
South Carolina resolutions and the governor’s recommendations, 
majority and minority reports were submitted by the committees to 
which they had been referred. These reports show that the legislature 
in the spring of i860, although strongly Democratic, was by no means 
unanimous as to what action should be taken by the state. That no 
definite action was taken indicates that the legislature did not at that 
time consider the situation very grave. The committee appointed by 
the senate unanimously agreed that the state was determined to pre¬ 
serve, adhere to, and defend the Union and the Constitution, but the 
committee differed as to the way it should be done, differed in ab¬ 
stract political opinion, and differed as to the kind of resolutions the 
legislature should adopt. The majority report, while maintaining the 
doctrine of the right of state defence against aggression, expressed 
a firm resolve to defend the Constitution and support the Union. The 
attempt of the Black Republicans to gain control of the federal govern¬ 
ment for the purpose of abolishing slavery was declared unconstitu¬ 
tional. And the committee called upon the other states to show their 
devotion to the Constitution by defeating that party in the coming fed¬ 
eral election. The minority report did not admit the constitutional 
right of secession. Secession was declared to be a revolutionary act 
justifiable only when the federal government showed itself incapable 
of protecting the essential rights of the states; nothing so far had 
occurred to justify such a revolutionary act; hence Texas considered 
the South Carolina resolution premature and unnecessary, and de¬ 
clined to appoint deputies to a meeting of the slaveholding states. 
But the committee also maintained that if the federal government 
should become powerless to protect the rights of the states, the Union 
would no longer be worth maintaining, and that then Texas would 
again, as in 1836, raise the revolutionary standard—but, it declared, 
“Texas has an abiding confidence in the conservative spirit of the 
American people, and in the continued preservation of the Constitu¬ 
tion and the Union.” 

In the house the majority report upheld the right of secession and 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 465 


declared that Texas would not submit to the degradation of being 
ruled by the Black Republican party, but would rather assert her 
independence. It pledged Texas to cooperate with the other Southern 
states, if it should become necessary to resist the federal wrongs. 
The minority report, on the other hand, denied the right of secession, 
and declared that none of the present alleged evils could be ascribed 
to the legitimate operations of the federal government, being charge¬ 
able to the disloyalty of those who, by obstructing the laws and author¬ 
ities, were themselves the enemies of the Union; that a dissolution of 
the Union could cure no evils; that it was inexpedient to send deputies 
to a convention of slaveholding states, and that there was not sufficient 
cause to justify Texas in taking any step looking toward the dissolu¬ 
tion of the Union. . . . 

But this legislature, which in i860, merely expressed its opinion in 
regard to the national controversy, cooperated fully with the secession 
convention the following spring. 

When Houston took his seat as governor, the political situation was 
tense throughout the country. The Compromise of 1850 had stayed 
for only a short time the progress of the slavery agitation, and with 
the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska act the contest again became 
serious. The civil war in Kansas, and the winning of the territory 
by the freesoilers in 1859, engendered hatred between the two sections. 
The refusal of the North to abide by the Dred Scott decision, as well 
as John Brown’s raid, fanned the flame of the secession movement in 
the South. The North was on the offensive, and determined that 
slavery should extend no further. The South was on the defensive 
and fully as determined that the solution of the slavery problem should 
be left to the South. In the event the North should succeed in barring 
slavery from the territories, the South believed it would soon attempt 
to do the same thing in the states. And, if the Constitution could not 
protect the Southern states in their constitutional rights within the 
Union, they would protect themselves outside of the Union. The 
entire time of the thirty-sixth Congress was devoted to heated debates 
between anti-slavery and pro-slavery agitators. The Northern mem¬ 
bers accused the Southern members of favoring and planning disunion, 
and were in turn, charged with refusing to enforce the fugitive slave 
law and to respect the Dred Scott decision. 

The leaders of the Texas democracy were just as alive to the 
situation as any of their Southern brethren. And, as it was a presi¬ 
dential year, the political excitement was great. The task of the 
South was to secure the nomination of a presidential candidate who 
favored Southern interests, and who at the same time might be 
strong enough throughout the country to defeat the Black Republican 
candidate. 

The Texas state Democratic convention convened at Galveston 
in April for the purpose of electing delegates to the national conven- 


466 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


tion at Charleston. The platform adopted looked entirely to the 
national political situation. It again endorsed the principles of the 
Cincinnati platform of 1856, and the Virginia and Kentucky resolu¬ 
tions; denied that Texas had given up any portion of its sovereignty 
in becoming a member of the Union; that in case of encroachment of 
the central government upon its sovereignty, Texas alone should judge 
of such encroachment; that Texas possessed the right as a sovereign 
state, to annul the compact, to revoke the powers it had delegated to 
the federal government and to withdraw from the Union; that every 
citizen had the right to move his property into any of the common 
territory, and to have it protected there under the federal Constitu¬ 
tion; that while Texas was attached to the Union, the election of a 
sectional President would force the state to hold itself in readiness 
to cooperate with the other Southern states in adopting such measures 
as might be necessary for protection. The resolutions further main¬ 
tained that the government was founded for the benefit of the white 
race, and concluded as follows: 

We regard any effort by the Black Republican party to disturb the happily 
existing subordinate condition of the negro race in the South as violative of 
the organic act guaranteeing the supremacy of the white race, and any political 
action which proposes to invest negroes with social and political equality with 
the white race, as an infraction of those wise and wholesome distinctions of 
nature which as testified by all experience were established to insure the pros¬ 
perity and happiness of each race. 

That the leaders of the secession movement had become intol¬ 
erant of any opposition that might tend to block their progress, was 
shown here also in the expulsion of W. W. Leland, of Karnes County, 
who was charged with entertaining abolition sentiments. 


Texas on the Eve of the Civil War 

That the tenor of events in Texas was rapidly becoming threaten¬ 
ing to the continued peace of the state is shown by the contents of the 
Galveston platform. Let us stop for a moment and consider the con¬ 
dition of the state, apart from politics, on the eve of the great struggle 
between unionism and disunionism within its borders. 

During the fifteen years that it had been in the Union, Texas had 
developed by leaps and bounds. The first census, taken after annexa¬ 
tion, in 1847, showed a population, including slaves, of one hundred 
thirty-five thousand, in round numbers. Three years later, there were 
two hundred twelve thousand five hundred ninety-two; and in i860, 
six hundred four thousand two hundred and fifteen. With this great 
increase in population had come economic prosperity; the people were 
prosperous and contented, and, with the exception of occasional Indian 
raids and troubles with Mexicans, lived in comparative peace. 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 467 


Frontier conditions prevailed, in the states, it is true, with all their 
restlessness and freedom; and the status of national politics increased 
this restlessness. Turbulence and violence were greater in i860 than 
at any time during the last few preceding years. During this eventful 
year the newspapers were full of stories of crimes committed within 
its borders. The True Issue deplored the fact that crime was on the 
increase and that the criminal laws were not enforced. One editorial 
stated that “high-handed criminality stalks abroad through the land, 
and bloody deeds of violence and of vengeance are transpiring con¬ 
stantly to mar the peace and harmony of society. . . . Human life 
hangs on the merest thread. No man’s life is safe.” William North, 
residing in Galveston at this time, says: “Such are the issues of life 
and death in Texas that a man is a little nearer death there all the 
while than in any other country we know of.” 

The atmosphere was filled with excitement and alarm. Reports 
were circulated, often unfounded, of negro uprisings and wholesale 
poisonings. Incendiary fires occurred in many parts of the state. 
A three hundred-thousand-dollar fire of incendiary origin occurred at 
Dallas, followed by many others in the surrounding country. The 
arrest of suspects led to the detection of a plot to perpetrate such 
acts on a still larger scale. According to a correspondent whose own 
printing press had been destroyed by the Dallas fire the plot was con¬ 
ceived by certain abolition preachers who had been expelled from that 
part of the country the year before. It was charged that the plan was 
to demoralize by fire and assassination the whole of northern Texas, 
and then, when the country should have been reduced to a helpless 
condition, a general revolt of the slaves, aided by white men from 
the North, was to take place on election day in August. Dallas, it 
seems, was fired for the purpose of destroying the arms and supplies 
stored there for a certain artillery company. Disastrous fires occurred 
almost simultaneously with the Dallas fire at Denton, Pilot Point, 
Belknap, Gainesville, Black Jack Grove, Waxahachie, Kaufman, and 
Navarro. Arms and quantities of poison were discovered in the pos¬ 
session of negroes, and some negroes were hanged on Red Oak Creek, 
near Waxahachie. Henderson had a two hundred and eleven thou¬ 
sand dollar fire, considered incendiary, which caused great excitement 
in the community and led to the hanging of several negroes. A plot 
was discovered at Lancaster in which the purpose of the abolitionists 
seemed to be to burn the town and poison the inhabitants. 

How much truth and how much mere groundless rumor caused by 
the excited state of the public mind there may have been in these 
reports and accusations will of course never be known. Governor 
Houston and his friends accused the Democratic press of circulating 
such rumors for political purposes, and in reply the State Gazette 
admitted that rumor had probably coined some statements and exag¬ 
gerated some facts, but that this was merely strong evidence that 


468 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


much had happened to excite the apprehensions and call for the 
vigilance of the people. 

Whether founded on fact or not, these rumors were quite generally 
believed, and caused unrest and intense excitement throughout the 
state; they also engendered a burning hatred of Northern abolitionists, 
and gave rise to the formation of vigilance committees for protection. 

Nearly every paper warned the people against the abolition enemy, 
advised the organization of vigilance committees, and urged the speedy 
execution of all incendiaries who might be detected. The Centerville 
Times , a Sam Houston paper, says: “To show how promptly the 
people of Texas act in defense of their rights, we may state that 
since the abolition plot has been discovered, there have been ten 
white men hung, several whipped, and many requested to make them¬ 
selves invisible in short order.” The Houston Telegraph thought it 
inconceivable that the emissaries of fanaticism could come among the 
Texans and carry out such plots. It was high time for all true men 
to come together and in the name of the people put to death or 
drive out every man who was not a friend of the institution of 
slavery. 

The viligance committees formed in many parts of the state ex¬ 
ercised extraordinary powers. The committee at Dallas, immediately 
after the great fire, hanged three negroes in the presence of a large 
assemblage of people. The committee of Grimes county was formed 
for the purpose of keeping the negroes in subordination and effectively 
ridding the country of all white persons attempting to influence the 
negroes. The one formed in Austin County had full authority to 
arrest any suspicious character “and hang him if necessary.” Three 
men were hanged at one time by the Fort Worth committee for tam¬ 
pering with slaves. Several ministers of the gospel were hanged, either 
for their abolition sentiments or for tampering with slaves. One 
paper presents to its readers the interesting caption “Another preacher 
hung,” and describes the execution by the Fort Worth committee 
of a preacher who had been returned to Texas from Arkansas at the 
request of the committee. His offense seemed to be that he had 
“prowled about the country” during the summer. His two sons had 
lost their lives a little earlier for being abolitionists. 

There can be no doubt but that these committees perpetrated many 
wicked deeds. A strong Sam Houston paper, in deploring that such 
was the fact, concluded, “Let us be understood at once. We are 
for the Constitution, the Union, and the enforcement of the laws; and 
we are against all Higher-lawism, mobbery, and vigilance committee 
usurpations.” Military companies were organized, in some cases for 
the express purpose of cooperating with the vigilance committees, but 
in most cases for general protection against the negroes and the 
abolition enemies both in the state and outside of it. The state 
militia was greatly encouraged and all classes of citizens joined. 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 469 


In the meantime the Democratic press seemed to have ever in 
view one thing, the forming of public opinion in favor of secession. 
Although the press stoutly declared before the presidential election 
that it did not advocate secession, it prepared the way for a decision 
on that subject by its editorial discussions and by the publication of 
timely articles and extracts from speeches of prominent men in Con¬ 
gress either admitting the right of secession or favoring it. The 
resources of Texas were shown to be such as to make Texas econom¬ 
ically and industrially independent of the Northern states. . . . 

The Union press put forth its efforts to counteract this influence 
and to warn the people against the designs of the ultra-radicals. 
Many articles against nullification, secession, and disunion were con¬ 
tributed. One correspondent of The Southern Intelligencer who 
signs himself “a backwoodsman” likens the Constitution to a kettle, 
at all times filled with nutritious food, around which Uncle Sam’s 
children, North and South, have been sitting and feasting until they 
have become fat, pampered and spoiled. Then in an evil and mis¬ 
chievous hour the children of the North attempt to break the slavery 
leg of this valuable kettle. The result is contention, bloodshed, and 
ruin to all. 

An editorial in the True Issue entitled “The Public Pulse,” pub¬ 
lished a few weeks earlier, seems to be an accurate description of 
the uncertain state of mind of the majority of the people: At break¬ 
fast a man says, “I am for secession emphatically; I am a disunionist 
per se ”; at noon, “I would willingly go for secession, unless the Black 
Republicans recede from their position, which I have some hopes of 
their doing”; at supper, “The condition of the country is truly alarm¬ 
ing, and I candidly confess my inability to fathom events that are 
to come”; at night, “Speak of that matter no more, for d—n me if 
I know where we are going, what is going to be done, what ought 
to be done, or what I am in favor of doing.” This editorial declares 
that thousands of men are of the same sentiment; that the people are 
justly indignant at the intolerance of the North and are willing, if 
necessary, to imperil their lives for their beloved Texas. “But when 
they come to weigh the value of this Union, consecrated by the blood 
of a hundred battles, and made holy by ten thousand glorious recol¬ 
lections, the true patriot pauses in bewilderment at the vastness of 
the crisis he is called upon to meet, and daring though his heart 
may be, and firm his nerve, he is overpowered at the contemplation 
of the bloody crest of Revolution.” 

The political factions were not idle. Houston took a positive stand 
in opposition to seccession. Secession to him meant the suicide of 
Texas, the course by which it would lose all its rights. He dinned 
into the ears of the people his belief that secession would prove a 
stupendous failure, and that they would lose by it that very state 
sovereignty they were trying to save. He and his friends headed the 


470 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Unionist party and supported the Bell-Everett ticket. Arrayed 
against them were the well-organized Democratic party and the 
majority of the newspapers in the state, supporting the Breckenridge 
and Lane ticket. The city of Austin became the headquarters for 
both parties. 

Houston and his friends did their utmost to check the efforts for 
secession made by the states’ rights men, many of whom were officers 
in the state government. They repudiated the Galveston platform as 
a gross misrepresentation of the wishes of the people, which might 
lead other states to believe that Texas was for secession. In reply 
the Democratic leaders maintained that none of their candidates had 
any disunion proclivities, and that the Galveston platform only upheld 
those political tenets which were conducive to the perpetuity of the 
Union, to the maintenance of states’ rights and to the protection of 
every kind of property under the Constitution. They accused the 
Unionists of being in favor of unconditional submission to the prin¬ 
ciples of the Black Republican party, in the hope that if Lincoln 
should be elected some of the Federal offices would fall to their share. 
Houston especially was widely accused of sacrificing the interest of 
the state to further his own political ambition. 

In the meantime the National Democratic Convention had met 
at Charleston April 24, i860, and had disagreed upon the national 
platform. The Southern delegates had withdrawn, but had met again 
June 23, i860, at Baltimore and nominated John C. Breckenridge, of 
Kentucky, for President and Joseph Lane, of Oregon, for Vice- 
President. These men represented the radical element of the Demo¬ 
cratic party and were not satisfactory to a large, portion of the country, 
even in the South. A constitutional Union party was organized. This 
party met at Baltimore, May 9, i860, and all the states except Oregon 
and South Carolina were represented. John Bell, of Tennessee, was 
nominated for President, and Edward Everett, of Massachusetts, for 
Vice-President. The aim of this party was to preserve the Union at 
all hazards. Another faction of the Democratic party nominated 
Douglas for the presidency, while the regular Republican party nomi¬ 
nated Lincoln. 

During the summer, barbecues and mass meetings were held in 
all parts of the state by both parties. Many resolutions relating to 
the situation were adopted. Some of these threatened secession in 
the event of Lincoln’s election. In Calhoun County a resolution was 
adopted to the effect that it was the duty of the Southern states to 
resist, even at the point of the bayonet, the inauguration of a sectional, 
Black Republican president. A non-partisan mass meeting in De Witt 
County declared that, although sincerely attached to the present Union, 
the people would never submit to the domination of Black Republican¬ 
ism—that if Lincoln were elected, the only thing for the South to do 
would be to dissolve all political connection with the people of the 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 471 

North. Resolutions adopted at the Union meetings denounced seces¬ 
sion and accused the Democrats of favoring it. 2 

The leaders of the Unionist party were placed on the defensive 
in this campaign. As the time for the election drew near, Lincoln’s 
victory appeared more and more probable. The question that was 
being asked throughout the state of the presidential electors was: 
“Do you consider the election of Lincoln sufficient cause for the 
dissolution of the Union?” Both the Bell and the Breckenridge elec¬ 
tors answered the question in the negative, but there was a general 
impression, nevertheless, that the election of Lincoln would be con¬ 
sidered a sufficient cause for secession. The task of the Union cam¬ 
paign speakers was therefore to defend the policy of the Union and 
to show the necessity of all Union-loving citizens uniting to defeat 
the Breckenridge ticket. Judge E. P. Townes of Travis County, at 
an enthusiastic Union meeting at La Grange, told the people in an 
able speech that this was the only way to preserve the Union. At 
a great Union demonstration at Austin, Houston extolled the glories 
of the common country, counseled submission, and showed how inex¬ 
pedient it would be for any state to withdraw from the Union, and 
declared that Lincoln’s election would not be sufficient cause for such 
action. He recommended acquiescence in whatever might be the result 
of the election, saying that in his opinion the salvation of the state 
lay in the Union. He then exhorted the lovers of the Union not to 
desert their posts and leave the government in the hands of seces¬ 
sionists. “If Mr. Lincoln,” he concluded, “administers the govern¬ 
ment in accordance with the Constitution, our rights must be respected. 
If he does not, the Constitution provides a remedy.” 

In the presidential election Breckenridge received 47,548 votes, 
and Bell, 15,463. The comparatively few votes cast for Bell in Texas 
must not be construed to mean that a complete revolution in public 
sentiment had taken place since the election of Houston the preced¬ 
ing year. Many good Unionists voted for Breckenridge because they 
felt he had a better chance to win than Bell; and the vast majority 
of Texans feared the election of Lincoln. The slave owners feared 
the consequence to their slaves, and most of the people believed the 
Federal government had no right to interfere with what they con¬ 
sidered their local affairs. This belief that the North was trying 
to dictate to the South greatly intensified the existing antagonism 
toward the Republicans. 

In Texas the result of Lincoln’s election was a radical change of 
sentiment. All felt that the North was the transgressor. The South 

2 I have found such resolutions adopted at Burnet, Round Rock, Winchester, 
Crockett, Bastrop, Hempstead, La Grange, Austin, and Cameron.. See various 
numbers of the True Issue and The Southern Intelligencer published during 
the summer of i860. Others would no doubt be discovered if more complete 
files of newspapers were available for the period. 


472 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


demanded liberty and equality. Only when these were granted could 
she bury her animosities and, as one newspaper says, “move on to 
the music of the Union.” 

While the Unionists still counseled submission to the Union, but 
resistance to fanaticism and tyranny, the Democrats came out openly 
for secession. The Gazette said it was folly to temporize with immi¬ 
nent danger or to appeal to the magnanimity of a sordid and vindictive 
foe; nothing could be gained in that way; all association with the 
Northern enemy should be discontinued and his emissaries hanged; 
no avowed anti-slavery man should be allowed to remain in Texas. 
That the power of the Democrats was again in the ascendency, and 
that they would control the situation, was shown as early as in the 
primary election in August. At that time the regular Democrats 
elected by large majorities their nominees to the State offices over the 
Unionist nominees. 

Some of the Sam Houston papers, as well as some of the inde¬ 
pendent newspapers in the state, supported the democratic ticket 
before Lincoln’s election. Radical resolutions in favor of secession 
were adopted in many parts of the state, and the Governor was urged 
to convene the legislature. All were anxious for action of some kind 
in regard to the situation. 

Karnes County advocated the maintenance of Southern rights 
within the Union, if possible, or secession if this should prove impos¬ 
sible; declared that the election of Lincoln was a sufficient cause for 
secession, and recommended the call of a Southern Congress to take 
into consideration the present state of the Union and of the South. 

A meeting at Belton also advised concerted action by the Southern 
states and requested the Governor to convene the legislature, or pro¬ 
vide for a convention of the people. Some counties, as for instance, 
Austin and Caldwell, were ready to cooperate with the rest of the 
state in any measures necessary for their safety. 

Other resolutions of a more radical character were adopted at 
mass meetings in Tarrant, Brazoria, and Lavaca counties. 

The Tarrant County resolutions earnestly requested the Governor 
to convene the legislature, but added that, if he should fail or refuse 
to do so, a state convention should at all events be held. 

The mass meeting of Brazoria, held November 17, declared for 
secession; recommended the holding of a convention at Galveston on 
January 8, for the purpose of determining what course Texas should 
pursue; and requested the chief justice of Brazoria County to order 
the election of five delegates to a state convention, the election to take 
place the first Monday in December, provided the Governor by that 
time had not issued a call for a special session of the legislature as 
he was requested to do. Two committees of safety, composed of 
sixteen members each, were provided to guard the interests of the 
county; and an organization of minute men was also provided to 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 473 

execute the committee’s order. These committees of safety for gen¬ 
eral protection and the organization of minute men to cooperate with 
them were authorized in a large number of the counties. 

The Lavaca County convention on November 21 favored seces¬ 
sion, and requested the Governor to convene the legislature or pro¬ 
vide for a state convention; it also urged that, if he should fail to 
do so, the people of the counties should appoint delegates to a state 
convention. 3 Marion County advised that the legislature convene 
itself in a non-official capacity, if the Governor declined to call it. 

Perhaps the trend of public opinion is even better shown in the 
True Issue, an independent paper. This paper deplored the fact that 
slavery had always been a source of strife between the two sections 
and declared that no important question had ever come before the 
people but that “slavery, like a haunting demon, looms up in the back¬ 
ground.” The North, in its hostility toward the slave law, in its 
descent upon Virginia, and in sending its emissaries to Texas to incite 
the slaves to arson and insurrection, was to blame for the present situa¬ 
tion, and what hatred existed in Texas toward the North was due 
to the action of the abolitionists there. The people of Texas wished 
only to live in peaceful enjoyment of their constitutional rights. 

A few days after the election of Lincoln, Houston received a 
letter signed by sixty-five citizens of Huntsville asking his advice as 
to what course ought to be pursued. They deprecated hasty action, 
but feared that delay in expressing opinions of the situation might 
prove harmful. Houston’s answer was calm and dignified but firm. 
He counseled patience, admitted his distrust of Lincoln and the North, 
but affirmed his abiding faith in the Constitution and the Union. He 
closed with these words: “So long as the Constitution is maintained 
by Federal authority and Texas is not made the victim of Federal 
wrong, I am for the Union as it is.” 

Houston and the Unionists, realizing that the tide of disunion 
sentiment was rising, busied themselves trying to stem the tide by 
recommending caution, prudence, and calm deliberation in dealing 
with the question. Until the last moment David G. Burnet counseled 
submission to the election of Lincoln and continuance in the Union. 
Union meetings were held throughout the state and were well attended. 
It was the sentiment of these meetings that the state should maintain 
its rights in the Union. Colonel Henderson, in addressing a mass 
meeting at Round Rock, called on all Texans td stand by the Amer¬ 
ican flag, and to claim boldly their rights in the Union under the Con¬ 
stitution. At a great demonstration at Austin on December 23, a pole 
ninety feet high was erected, and the national flag hoisted while the 
people sang patriotic songs. Judge J. H. Reagan, then in Congress, 

3 Other counties in which the people advocated secession and requested 
Houston to convene the legislature were Polk, Dallas, Smith, Coryell, Sabine, 
Leon, Grimes, and Galveston. 


474 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


writing from Washington, recommended a convention of the Southern 
states to present to the free states such propositions as would renew 
the original guarantees of the Constitution in favor of Southern rights 
in order that the question as to the extent and character of the slave 
states and the ownership of slave property might be settled forever. 
On the other hand, Louis T. Wigfall, also in Congress and writing 
from Washington, advocated immediate withdrawal from the Union, 
maintaining that Texas could not remain in it with either honor or 
safety. 

In spite of the heavy pressure brought to bear upon Houston to 
call a special session of the legislature, he refused to issue the call 
until forced by circumstances. He gave as his reasons for not doing 
so that the situation did not demand the convening of the legislature, 
and that the finances of the state were in such a condition that it was 
necessary to keep all expenses down to a minimum. It also appears 
that Houston entertained serious doubts as to whether, on account 
of the recent redistricting act, the same legislature that met in i860 
could again be convened. He believed furthermore, that a legislature 
elected under the new act would probably come nearer to representing 
the wishes of the people. 4 

In the meantime, Houston had acted upon the suggestions of some 
county conventions to make use of the joint resolution of 1858 author¬ 
izing the Governor to order an election of seven delegates to a con¬ 
vention of the Southern states, if, in his opinion, the situation should 
demand it. He sent the resolution, accompanied by a letter to the 
governors of the other Southern states suggesting the calling of a 
Southern convention for the purpose of discussing plans for common 
action. He said that in his opinion the time had come for a calm 
deliberation of statesmen in a manner permitted under the Constitu¬ 
tion. He hoped that such a convention might adopt measures for 
restoring harmony between the two sections of the country. Houston 
then issued a proclamation for the election of the Texan delegates on 
the first Monday in February. For this effort at conciliation Houston 
was widely denounced as a traitor to the South. Senator Wigfall 
said that Governor Houston ought to be tarred and feathered and 
driven from the state. Senator Iverson from Georgia, his old antago¬ 
nist in the Senate, said, “Some Texas Brutus may arise to rid his 
country of this old, hoary-headed traitor.” 

In order to understand all phases of the secession movement in 
Texas, the existence of a secret order known as the Knights of the 
Golden Circle must be noticed. It met a hearty welcome in Texas 
in the summer of i860, and much has been said about the influence 

4 The old act passed in 1852 divided the representation in the legislature 
disproportionally. For instance, Galveston with only eight hundred and seven¬ 
teen votes had one senator, while Milam and Burleson with nearly two thousand 
six hundred votes had only one .—State Gazette, December 10, 1859. 


THE GROWTH OF THE SECESSION MOVEMENT 475 


that it exerted over the events that rapidly followed in the state dur¬ 
ing the winter and spring of i860 and 1861. [Several pages discuss¬ 
ing the origin and work of the Knights of the Golden Circle are 
omitted.] . . . 

To what extent, however, the order influenced the secession con¬ 
vention, directly or indirectly, must remain a matter of surmise. The 
most that one can safely say is that probably the order encouraged 
secession and the extension of slavery, and that it was a factor of 
some importance in forming and uniting public opinion at this time. 

The people of Texas had always distinguished between abolition¬ 
ists and Unionists. During the whole period of the controversy over 
slavery there had been men who strongly upheld the Constitution and 
the Union. As the agitation developed and disunion became a prob¬ 
ability, the newspapers representing the Union element became known 
as anti-secession and anti-democratic papers. But no real abolition¬ 
ists, men or newspapers, had ever met with much favor in Texas. 
The San Antonio Zeitung seems to have been the only such newspaper 
that ever attempted to exist and publish abolition views in the state. 
It was published only one year, partly in 1855 and partly in 1856. 
[Several pages describing the popular attitude toward abolitionists 
are omitted.] . . . 


CHAPTER XXXVI 


THE FIRST SESSION OF THE SECESSION CONVENTION 

IN TEXAS 

By Anna Irene Sandbo 

[This selection is a continuation of the preceding chapter, and, like that 
chapter, is considerably abbreviated by omissions.] 

As the result of Governor Houston’s refusal to take any steps 
toward calling a convention it became necessary for the disunion lead¬ 
ers to call the secession convention in an extra-legal manner. The 
Governor had been besieged by committees and petitions to convene 
the legislature, or to issue a call for a convention. He hesitated to 
do either, probably hoping that the excitement would soon subside, 
and that it would be in his power to save Texas to the Union. But 
his hopes were not to be realized, for the radical element was in 
control of the state. All the Southern states were taking action, and 
Texas was eager to do likewise. The leaders of the secession move¬ 
ment took the matter into their own hands. According to Judge O. M. 
Roberts, chairman of the secession convention, the reasons for so 
doing were that they were anxious to unite with the other Southern 
states, and as there were both Union and secession elements in the 
state, they feared internecine strife, when the North should attempt 
to force the Southern states back into the Union; and that the only 
way to unite the people in a common defense of the state, in spite 
of the will of the Governor, was to determine the status of Texas 
by a vote of the people. 

It would thus appear that the leaders of the movement fully real¬ 
ized that the outcome of secession might be war. But it is equally 
certain that the common people did not believe such would be the 
case, and that they were purposely encouraged in this belief. The 
great task of Governor Houston during the interval between the pass¬ 
ing of the secession ordinance and its ratification was an heroic 
attempt to convince the people that secession meant war. 

Under the constitution, neither the Governor nor the legislature 
had direct authority to call a convention. But the Governor had 
authority to convene the legislature in special session, and once con¬ 
vened, even in special session, the general powers of the legislature 
would be quite extensive. Had Houston convened the legislature, it 

476 


FIRST SESSION OF THE CONVENTION 


477 


would probably have called a state convention, but as he refused to 
do this, it appeared necessary that the convention be called without 
the cooperation of either the Governor or the legislature. This was 
done. 

The plan to issue an address calling upon the people to elect dele¬ 
gates to a state convention originated in the attorney general's office. 
The first address was drawn up in Justice O. M. Roberts's office by 
W. P. Rogers, George M. Flournoy, John S. Ford, and O. M. Roberts. 
This address appears in Judge Roberts’s Political , Legislative and 
Judicial History of TexasJ In the Journal of the Secession Conven¬ 
tion another address is printed which differs somewhat from the 
copy that Roberts gives. Thus, the Roberts call has sixty-one sig¬ 
natures, while the call printed in the Journal has seventy-two. 1 2 

The reasons given in the Journal address for calling a convention 
are the election of a sectional President; the imminent danger to 
Southern rights; the Governor's refusal to convene the legislature; 
the fact that the sovereign will of the people could be best expressed 
by a convention; that neither governor nor legislature was authorized 
under the Constitution to call a convention, though the people had 
the right to do so; that there was not enough time before the Presi¬ 
dent’s inauguration for the legislature to act; and finally that the 
legislature would probably ratify the work of the convention. The 
address suggested that the election be held January 8, 1861, and 
that the convention meet at Austin January 28. Elections were to 
be ordered unofficially by the chief justice of each representative 
district, or, in case of his failure, by one or more county commis¬ 
sioners or by a committee of five citizens. The election was to be 
conducted according to the usual regulations; two delegates were to 
be elected from each representative district, and the action of the 
convention was to be submitted to the people for ratification or 
rejection. 

As soon as the address was published secession became the issue. 
Houston in a last vain effort to thwart the action of the secessionists, 
issued a call, December 17, for an extra session of the legislature 
to meet January 21, just one week before the day appointed for the 
meeting of the convention. During the interval between the time 
of the publication of the address and the assembling of the conven¬ 
tion great excitement prevailed. Mass meetings and barbecues were 
again held. Able Union and disunion speakers expounded their views 
on the situation. The lovers of the Union tried to persuade the people 
to act with calmness, to believe that in the Union was the best place 

1 In A Comprehensive History of Texas, II. 

2 The names of W. J. Darden, J. P. Gibson, T. N. Waul, Wm. Carleton, 
J. H. Lightfoot, James E. Harrison, Robert J. Townes, A. R. Crozier, J. M. 
Steiner, C. Kyle and M. D. Graham are found in the Journal but not in Justice 
Roberts’s call. Other signers of the two calls were identical. 


478 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


for the state so long as the Constitution could be preserved, and that 
the proper thing to do was to preserve both the Constitution and the 
Union, for the disruption of the Union would bring only universal 
distress to Texas. They accused the secessionists of not wishing to 
see the Union preserved on any terms and of closing their eyes to the 
true remedies for the evil. They also accused the politicians of delib¬ 
erately hoodwinking the people in pretending that they would submit 
the action of the convention to the people. But the Union element 
had, with the exception of Houston, scarcely any strong and aggres¬ 
sive leader, and even Houston was not equal to the occasion. The 
Union sympathisers appeared to be silent spectators of the great 
drama played, and the majority of them did not even vote. 

The aggressive leaders of secession, on the other hand, carried 
everything before them. The whole movement seems to have been 
much more spontaneous than has generally been believed. At many 
mass meetings immediately after Lincoln’s election such a conven¬ 
tion as the address provided for had been advocated. In some in¬ 
stances action was talcen for the election of delegates to a convention 
of the people even before the address was issued. At a mass meet¬ 
ing in Brazoria County, November 17, i860, the chief justice was 
requested to order an election on December 3 for delegates to a state 
convention. On that date John A. Wharton was elected and repre¬ 
sented the county in the secession convention. On November 24, 
the chief justice of Harrison County was directed by the citizens in 
mass meeting to order an election the fourth Monday in December 
for delegates to a general state convention. The delegates then elected 
became members of the convention. Some other counties held their 
elections for delegates before the appointed time, as Robertson, 
December 15; Tyler, December 22; Austin, December 22; Cameron, 
January 7. So far as the certificates of elections show, only four 
counties, Jefferson, Orange, Anderson, and Trinity, gave no returns. 

The Eighth Legislature, at the call of Governor Houston, convened 
in extra session on January 21. The Governor’s message, after 
reviewing at some length the Indian troubles and the embarrassed con¬ 
dition of the treasury, was devoted to the relations of Texas with 
the federal government. He deplored the fact that an aggressive 
sectional party, hostile to Southern institutions, had gained control 
of the general government, and he said that two alternatives now 
faced the people—either to abandon the federal government, which 
would be tantamount to acknowledging the Constitution a failure, 
or to maintain while in the Union every constitutional right. He 
advised the latter, for, so far, the grievances had originated with the 
states and not with the federal government. He advised against hasty 
and unconcerted action and against immediate separation before hav¬ 
ing stated grievances and demanded redress; and he could see in 
the election of Lincoln no cause for immediate and separate secession. 


FIRST SESSION OF THE CONVENTION 


479 


He also declared that he believed the time had come when the Southern 
states should cooperate and counsel together^ to devise means for the 
maintenance of their constitutional rights, and to demand redress for 
the grievances they had suffered at the hands of the Northern states. 

He had ordered an election for the purpose of choosing delegates 
to a Southern convention, as recommended by the joint resolutions 
of 1858. He recommended, further, that the legislature provide legal 
means by which the people might express their will through the ballot 
box; and if the legislature deemed it necessary to call a convention 
for the purpose he would not oppose it. He would only suggest that 
no action should be considered final until it had been submitted to 
the people. He looked to them for wise and sagacious counsels, “Rep¬ 
resenting the creative power of law,” he said, “the high responsibilities 
upon you demand that you indignantly frown upon any and every 
attempt to subvert the laws and substitute in their stead the will of 
revolutionary leaders.” Only the people could determine upon the 
status of Texas, and therefore he recommended that the question be 
submitted to them, and concluded: “Be their voice as it may, we 
shall be united and whether our future be prosperous or gloomy, a 
common faith and hope will actuate us; but if on the contrary, moved 
by rash and unwise counsels, you yield the powers of government 
into the hands of those who do not represent the people and would 
rise superior to them, the confidence of the masses in the reign of law 
and order will be shaken, and gloomy forebodings will fill the hearts 
of the friends of regulated Government, lest the reign of anarchy 
and confusion come upon us.” 

The legislature, however, disregarded the Governor’s recommen¬ 
dations and proceeded to do the very things he had urged it not to 
do. One of the first resolutions adopted, repealed the joint resolution 
of 1858 under which the Governor had acted the preceding Novem¬ 
ber. The friendly feeling toward the extra-legal convention was also 
shown almost immediately. As the delegates to the convention arrived 
at Austin, they were invited to seats within the bar of the Senate and 
the House. Although the Governor’s friends made an attempt to 
carry out his wishes, they could accomplish nothing. Throckmorton’s 
resolution providing for the election of delegates to a general conven¬ 
tion of the people of Texas was referred to the committee on State 
Affairs, from which it never emerged. But a joint resolution offered 
by Mr. Herbert to validate the acts of the convention to be held at 
Austin, January 28, 1861, which further provided for the mileage 
and per diem of the members of the convention, referred to the same 
committee appeared again in a short time transformed into the fol¬ 
lowing resolution, which was adopted January 26: 

Whereas the people of Texas, being much concerned for the preservation 
of the rights, liberties, and powers of the State and its inhabitants, endangered 
by the political action of a majority of the states, and the people of the same 


480 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


have, in the exercise of powers reserved to themselves in the bill of rights, 
called a convention, composed of two members for each representative in the 
legislature from the various districts established by the apportionment law of 
i860, to assemble on the 28th day of January, 1861, at the city of Austin, which 
convention, by the terms of the call, made by the numerous assemblages of 
citizens in various parts of the state, was, when elected and assembled, to have 
power to consider the conditions of public affairs, to determine what shall be 
the future relations of this state to the Union, and such other matters as are 
necessarily and properly incident thereto; and in case it should be determined 
by said convention, that it is necessary for the preservation of the rights and 
liberties aforesaid, that the sovereignty of Texas should resume the powers 
delegated to the federal government in the Constitution of the United States, 
and by the articles of annexation, then the ordinance of said convention re¬ 
suming said delegated powers and repealing the ratification by the people of 
Texas of said articles of annexation should be submitted to a vote of the 
qualified electors of this state for their ratification or rejection; therefore, 

1. Be it resolved by the legislature of the state of Texas, That the govern¬ 
ment of the state of Texas hereby give its assent to and approves of the con¬ 
vention aforesaid. 

2. That this resolution take effect and be in force from and after its passage. 

It was, however, not approved by the Governor until February 
4, 1861, and then it was approved with a protest against the assump¬ 
tion of any power on the part of the convention, beyond that of 
referring the question of secession to the people. 

A joint resolution was also passed relative to coercion in which 
the legislature maintained in substance that the sovereign states had 
denied to the federal government the power to compel by arms obedi¬ 
ence by the states to federal authority; that the attempt of the federal 
government to coerce a state was a violation of the Constitution, 
destructive to the right of free government, and fatal to the existence 
of the Union; that should the federal government attempt to coerce 
a sister state into subjection to federal rule Texas would make com¬ 
mon cause with her in resisting, by all means and to the last extremity, 
such violence and usurpation of power. 

All action taken by the legislature in the early part of its session 
was in accord and sympathy with the convention. The House ten¬ 
dered the use of its hall to the convention each day after two o’clock, 
and fuel and stationery were placed at its disposal. 

After the secession ordinance had been passed the legislature coop¬ 
erated with the convention in placing the ordinance before the people 
for ratification or rejection. Two acts were passed for this purpose. 
The first, passed over the Governor’s veto, merely required the officers 
of the state to order elections for the ratification or rejection of the 
ordinance of secession according to the directions of the state con¬ 
vention. Two days later it became necessary to pass a supplemental 
act requiring the Governor to issue a proclamation for the election, 
and to direct the vote to be taken and returns to be made in the 
manner prescribed in the first act and in the ordinance of the conven- 


FIRST SESSION OF THE CONVENTION 


481 


tion on the subject. This act was approved by the Governor Febru¬ 
ary 9, with a protest against the short time allowed for notice. 

The first secession convention convened at Austin, January 28, 
1861. The personnel of the convention, according to the correspon¬ 
dent of The True Issue, consisted of a respectable body of men, both 
in personal appearance and in point of intelligence; but there were 
many conjectures as to what it would do. According to the same 
correspondent, some thought that the action of the convention would 
be declared binding without any reference to the people. Some 
believed the convention intended to usurp sovereign power, subvert 
the state government, and erect a provincial one in its stead; and 
that, if this should be attempted, neither Houston nor his friends 
would resort to arms to suppress and prevent it. 

The organization of the convention was effected the first day. 
O. M. Roberts was elected president, R. T. Brownrigg, secretary, 
W. D. Schofield, first assistant secretary, and R. H. Lundy, second 
assistant secretary. There had been some irregularities in the elec¬ 
tion of certain members, but the report of the committee on creden¬ 
tials favored seating them all and contests were thus avoided. In 
a number of the counties, namely Tyler, Harden, Titus, Harrison, 
Karnes and Bee, more delegates had been elected than such counties 
were entitled to under the call. The committee recommended that 
all such delegates be allowed seats, but that they should have only 
as many votes as the number assigned to the county they represented. 
In Travis, Williamson, and Milam counties the six delegates had not 
been elected in the manner indicated by the call, but they also were 
seated. [Details of organization are omitted here.] . . . 

The direct issue before the convention came up on the second day, 
when Mr. Wharton offered a resolution “that without determining 
now the manner in which this result should be effected, it is the delib¬ 
erate sense of this convention that the state of Texas should separately 
secede from the Federal Union.” This was adopted by a majority of 
one hundred and fifty-two to six. At this juncture it was learned 
that John McQueen, commissioner from South Carolina to Texas, 
had reached Austin. A resolution was immediately passed inviting 
him to a seat upon the president’s stand during the session, and a 
committee of three was appointed to inform him of the action of 
the convention. . . . 

On January 30, the convention received from the legislature a 
copy of some Tennessee resolutions, accompanied by a letter of Gov¬ 
ernor Houston addressed to the legislature. The Tennessee resolu¬ 
tions were in the nature of a reply to certain resolutions recently 
passed by the legislature of New York. The legislature of New 
York had offered men and money to the President of the United 
States for the purpose, according to the language of the Tennessee 
resolution, “of coercing certain sovereign states of the South into 


482 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


obedience to the Federal Government/’ Governor Houston in his 
letter advised the legislature to meet every assault upon the liberties 
of the people. He again reminded them of the fact that he had 
called them together to provide for an expression of the will of the 
people at the ballot box, and that while the people were deliberating 
upon the question no impending threat of coercion from the people 
of another state should be permitted without at least meeting with 
the condemnation of their legislature. 

Several resolutions had been offered in regard to the convention’s 
getting into official communication with the Governor, and all had 
finally, on January 30, been referred to a special committee of three. 
This committee on the same day reported a mode of procedure, which 
was immediately adopted. The report provided for a committee of 
five to be appointed by the president, whose duty it should be to wait 
upon the Governor and to confer with him on subjects connected with 
federal relations; it provided also for a like committee to inform the 
legislature that the convention was organized and ready to proceed 
with the work before it, and that the convention desired to act in 
harmony with the various departments of the state government. John 
H. Reagan, P. W. Gray, John D. Stell, Thos. J. Devine, and W. P. 
Rogers were appointed to wait upon the Governor. 

Houston received the committee kindly, expressed his thanks to 
the convention for its courtesy, and promised to communicate with 
the convention the next day. In this communication to the committee, 
Houston said that whatever appeared conducive to the welfare of the 
people had his most fervent good wishes, and that no one would be 
more ready than he to yield obedience to the will of the people, when 
it had been expressed through the ballot box; he was ready to act in 
harmony with the convention in securing an expression of the popular 
will in regard to federal relations, and he would cheerfully confer 
with any committee appointed for that purpose. But he did not 
commit himself any further. 

At the afternoon session on January 30, the ordinance of seces¬ 
sion was placed before the convention by the Committee on Federal 
Relations, accompanied by a minority report, which minority report 
concurred with the majority in recommending the ordinance reported 
by the committee, but dissented from the resolution accompanying 
the ordinance which proposed to refer the ordinance to a vote of 
the people, taking the position that the interests of the state could 
be best served by the ordinance’s taking effect immediately. The 
ordinance was read the first time, and the convention adjourned to 
meet again in secret session in the evening. The ordinance, which 
was finally adopted in its original form, is as follows: 

Sec. I. Whereas, the Federal Government has failed to accomplish the pur¬ 
poses of the compact of union between these states in giving protection either 
to the persons of our people upon an exposed frontier or to the property of our 


FIRST SESSION OF THE CONVENTION 


483 


citizens; and whereas the action of the Northern states of the Union, and the 
recent development in federal affairs, make it evident that the power of the 
federal government is sought to be made a weapon with which to strike down 
the interests and prosperity of the Southern people, instead of permitting it to 
be as it was intended, our shield against outrage and aggression: 

Therefore, We the people of the state of Texas in convention do declare 
and ordain, that the ordinance adopted by our convention of delegates on the 
4th day of July, a.d. 1845, and afterwards ratified by us, under which the 
republic of Texas was admitted into the Union with other states and became 
a party to the compact styled “The Constitution of the United States of 
America” be and is hereby repealed and annulled; that all the powers that by 
said compact were delegated by Texas to the federal government are revoked 
and resumed; that Texas is of right absolved from all restraints and obligations 
incurred by said compact and is a separate sovereign state. 

Sec. 2. This ordinance shall be submitted to the people of Texas for ratifi¬ 
cation or rejection by the qualified voters on the 23rd day of February, a.d. 
1861, and unless rejected by a majority of the votes cast shall take effect and 
be in force on and after the 2nd day of March, a.d. 1861. 

At this secret evening session the discussion upon the ordinance 
began, and it was continued until the next evening, when it was decided 
to vote the next day at twelve o’clock, and to do so without discus- 
sion. There appears to have been much disagreement in regard to 
the contents of the ordinance. . . . 

On the following day, February 1, the Governor, lieutenant-gover¬ 
nor, and judges of the supreme and district courts, were invited to 
seats within the bar of the convention when the vote on the ordi¬ 
nance was to be taken. Five men were appointed as a committee 
to wait on Houston and Clark. Houston was given a seat on the 
right of the president. At the appointed time the ordinance was 
taken up, read a third time and passed by a vote of one hundred 
sixty-six to eight. Although it had been decided the evening before 
that no discussion should take place when the vote was taken, many 
of the members of the convention could not refrain from giving 
the reasons for their votes. 

The most exciting incident of the vote was caused by J. W. 
Throckmorton’s remarks. He rose from his seat and said: “Mr. 
President, in view of the responsibility, in the presence of God and 
my country—and unawed by the wild spirit of revolution around me, 
I vote no.” Much confusion followed. Hisses as well as applause 
came from the galleries. Throckmorton rose from his seat and ex¬ 
claimed: “Mr. President, when the rabble hiss, well may patriots 
tremble.” Prolonged cheering from the galleries followed, and a 
strong appeal from the president was necessary to restore order. 

With the passage of the ordinance the first act in the drama of 
secession was at an end. . . . 

The next afternoon, February 2, the special committee appointed 
for the purpose, presented an address setting forth the causes that 
impelled Texas to withdraw from the Union. The causes as thus 


484 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


set forth were: that Texas had not been permitted to enjoy the 
blessings guaranteed to it when it became a member of the Union; 
that for the purpose of acquiring power in the Federal Government 
in order to destroy the institutions of Texas and of the other slave¬ 
holding states, the controlling majority of the Federal Government 
had under various disguises administered the government in such 
a way as to exclude the citizens of the Southern states from the enjoy¬ 
ment of the common territories; that because of the disloyalty of the 
North and the “imbecility of the Federal Government/’ combinations 
of outlaws had been permitted to trample upon the federal laws in 
Kansas, upon the lives and property of Southern citizens there, and 
to usurp the possession of the territory for the benefit of the Northern 
states; that the Federal Government had failed to protect the borders 
of Texas from the Indians or the Mexicans; that when the state had 
expended money for that purpose, the Federal Government had refused 
to reimburse the state; that the individual non-slaveholding states had 
deliberately violated the Constitution; that the people in these states 
had formed themselves into a great sectional party for the purpose 
of abolishing slavery and forcing political equality between the two 
races; that the abolitionists had been sowing seeds of discord between 
the two sections, and had consolidated their strength and placed the 
slave-holding states in a hopeless minority in Congress; that the 
South could no longer protect its rights there against encroachments; 
that these adversaries proclaimed a law higher than the Constitution, 
and had encouraged lawless organizations to steal slaves and prevent 
their recapture; that they had invaded Southern soil, murdered unof¬ 
fending citizens, sent seditious pamphlets to stir up insurrection, and 
emissaries to burn towns and to distribute arms and poison to the 
slaves; and that they had elected a sectional president. 

In view of these facts the convention proclaimed its belief that 
the government was established exclusively for the white race; that 
the African race was rightfully held and regarded as an inferior and 
dependent race and that only in that condition could their existence 
in the country be rendered beneficial and tolerable; that all white men 
are and of right ought to be entitled to equal civil and political rights; 
that slavery was authorized and justified by the experience of man¬ 
kind, by the revealed will of the Creator, and recognized by all 
Christian nations; that the destruction of existing relations between 
the two races would bring inevitable calamities upon both; that as 
six states had seceded there was no course open for Texas except 
to unite her destiny with those states. 

John H. Reagan, Louis T. Wigfall, John Hemphill, T. N. Waul, 
John Gregg, W. S. Oldham, and Wm. B. Ochiltree were elected to 
represent Texas at the Montgomery convention. No more business 
of importance was transacted by the convention during its first 
session. 


FIRST SESSION OF THE CONVENTION 


485 


The first session of the convention adjourned February 5, to con¬ 
vene again March 2; and Judge Roberts, after congratulating the 
convention on its courteous and conciliatory deliberations, adjourned 
the convention in the following words: 

“Let us go home and appeal to them [the people] to sustain our 
action by their votes; and when we reassemble on the 2nd of March 
let us bring back with us the voice of a united people, in favor of 
an immediate action to sustain the rights of the people of Texas 
and of the South at all hazards, and to the last extremity. ,, 


CHAPTER XXXVII 


TEXAS DURING THE CIVIL WAR 

By Charles W. Ramsdell 

[From Ramsdell, Reconstruction in Texas, 21-26 (Columbia University 
Press, New York, 1910). Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapter XXIII; Barker, 
Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 224-242.] 

Texas during the War 

Texas was formally admitted to the Confederacy by an act of 
Congress approved March 1, 1861. On the previous day, Jefferson 
Davis, in accordance with another act, had assumed control over all 
military operations in the various states having reference to other 
states or foreign powers; but not until Houston was removed was 
this authority fully recognized in Texas. When the attack on Fort 
Sumter and Lincoln’s call for volunteers dissipated the hope that war 
could be avoided, Texas was called upon for 3,000 troops and then 
for 5,000 more. In addition to those raised through the agency of 
the state, a number of battalions and regiments were raised by indi¬ 
viduals and mustered directly into the Confederate service. During 
the following winter the legislature provided for a mounted regiment 
of rangers for frontier service, and, to expedite and regulate enlist¬ 
ment in the Confederate army, divided the state into thirty-three 
“brigade districts” in each of which all able-bodied men between the 
ages of eighteen and fifty years, with necessary exceptions, were to 
be enrolled in companies subject to the call of the Confederate gov¬ 
ernment. The Confederate “conscript law” of April 16, 1862, brought 
into active service immediately all men between the ages of eighteen 
and thirty-five, for three years or for the war. This age limit was 
extended again and again until the country was almost drained of its 
men. It is estimated that Texas furnished between 50,000 and 65,000 
men for military service, 1 of whom about one-fourth were east of 
the Mississippi. The rest were scattered about in the Trans-Missis¬ 
sippi Department, in Louisiana, Arkansas, on the frontiers and 
coast of Texas, in garrisons or on special detail in the interior. 

1 The lower figures are probably more nearly correct. The bewildering 
merging of battalions into regiments and the reduction of the latter to battalions 
again make any estimate uncertain. 


486 


TEXAS DURING THE CIVIL WAR 


487 


When once the war was fairly on, most of those who had opposed 
the measures which brought it about, yielded and gave their support 
to the state and the new government. In every Texas regiment, from 
Virginia to the Rio Grande, were to be found recent Unionists who 
gave to the Confederacy an allegiance as sincere and as strenuous 
as did the original secessionists. There were others who never parted 
with their Unionist belief but went into the army from necessity; for 
often it was safer to stand in line of battle than to remain at home 
as a known opponent of the Southern cause. Some escaped active 
service by securing appointment upon special details near home, some 
by election or appointment to political office. All of these things, how¬ 
ever, required an oath of allegiance to the Confederacy, and there 
were many whose strength of conviction would not permit this. To 
avoid it some left the state immediately and made their way North; 
others lingered with their families, hiding at times in the woods and 
hills to escape conscript officers, provost-marshals, vigilance commit¬ 
tees, and mobs, until compelled or enabled to slip out of the country 
and get into the Union lines for safety. This was held to be desertion 
to the enemy, and capture meant ignominious death. Many were 
murdered by mobs for the expression of unpopular opinions, and 
many more because of private grudges screened by charges of trea¬ 
sonable designs. The story is a painful one, but it could hardly have 
been otherwise. When a desperate war is being waged, when the 
enemy is thundering at the gates, perfect tolerance can hardly be 
expected for expressions of sympathy with the invader. The North 
never suffered as did the fire-encircled South, but the experiences of 
the northern “copperhead” were often as harsh as those of the south¬ 
ern loyalist. In Texas this inevitable tendency to lawlessness was 
accelerated by the presence of so many turbulent characters in her 
frontier population. 2 

In general, Texas was fairly prosperous during the war—espe¬ 
cially during the first two or three years. She lay well outside the 
circle of conflict; no hostile armies laid waste her towns and fields 
nor withdrew her slaves from the plantations. Good crops were raised 
every year, although nearly all the able-bodied men were away in the 
army. Slaves were in fact more plentiful than ever before, for great 
numbers of them had been run in from Louisiana, Arkansas, and 
states even further east, for safe-keeping. Texas was, therefore, in 
a position to perform a unique service to the rest of the Confederacy 
in furnishing supplies not only from her own fields and ranches but 
also, by way of Mexico, from Europe. The early blockade of all 
or nearly all southern ports and the uncertain dependence upon 
blockade runners rendered the Mexican trade of particular importance. 
It was, however, beset with many difficulties. A distance of nearly 

2 For an account of the work of vigilance committees in the region about 
San Antonio, see Williams, With the Border Ruffians. 


488 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


four hundred miles, through a region part desert, without railroads, 
infested with brigands, had to be traversed by wagon trains heavily 
guarded. Nor was this all. Hard cash was necessary for purchasing 
the goods needed, as the commercial world looked askance at Con¬ 
federate notes and bonds. In lieu of gold and silver, recourse was 
had to domestic articles—cotton, wool, and hides. Cotton, especially, 
was in demand abroad and found ready sale. The problem now was 
for the government to get the cotton and secure its transportation to 
some point of exchange. 

The state first undertook the task, and in April, 1862, a military 
board was created to purchase arms and ammunition for the state. 
After disposing of a quantity of United States indemnity bonds, ob¬ 
tained in 1850, the board began purchasing cotton with eight-per-cent 
state bonds, and during the first year transported some five thousand 
bales to the Rio Grande. For several reasons, however, the board 
was never able to accomplish all that it had designed. Planters were 
loath to exchange their cotton for doubtful state bonds so long as 
there was a chance to get gold for it, and often refused to deliver 
cotton actually contracted for. Failure to get the cotton promptly to 
the Rio Grande damaged the board’s credit with the importers of 
foreign wares. The peculation of officials engaged in the work created 
confusion; and rivalry with the cotton bureau that was established by 
the Confederate authorities in 1863, weakened the efforts of both the 
state and the general governments. It is needless to go into the story 
of mismanagement, misfortune and peculation that characterized so 
much of this business; for a great deal of real benefit was derived 
from it notwithstanding. Important also is the fact that a great deal 
of private cotton found its way into Mexico and across the Gulf to 
Cuba and Europe, and that a slender but steady stream of hard cash 
flowed back into Texas; and although the greater part of the money 
went into the pockets of favored speculators, “exempts,” “details” 
and officers, the state at large profited somewhat. Texas came out 
of the war with plenty of food for her people and more hard money 
than all the rest of the South together. 

The military operations in the state are worthy of but slight notice. 
They were never extensive and were confined to the border, and they 
therefore left no such reconstruction problems in their train as existed 
in the other states. In the summer of 1861 an expedition under Gen¬ 
eral H. H. Sibley for the capture and occupation of New Mexico 
reached Santa Fe, but was driven back the following spring. In 
August, 1862, a band of some seventy German Unionist refugees were 
overtaken on the Nueces River by a superior force of “partisan 
rangers” and almost annihilated. Some prisoners were taken and 
afterwards killed—a dastardly outrage which the Germans of western 
Texas never forgave. A few minor engagements along the coast 
resulted in the better fortification of the ports. In October, 1862, 


TEXAS DURING THE CIVIL WAR 


489 


a Federal squadron forced the evacuation of Galveston, which was 
occupied by United States troops just before Christmas. On New 
Year’s eve the Confederate General Magruder, who had just assumed 
command of the District of Texas, moved troops over to the island 
and in the early morning light attacked the forces stationed there, 
while improvised gun-boats fortified with cotton bales assailed the 
fleet in the harbor. The attack resulted in a complete victory; the 
city was taken and the Federal ships captured, driven off, or de¬ 
stroyed. Galveston remained in the hands of the Confederates during 
the rest of the war and was valuable as a port of entry, though 
United States warships patrolled the Gulf. In September, 1863, an 
attempt was made by General Banks to invade Texas by way of 
Sabine Pass, Beaumont, and Houston; but the invading force with its 
convoy of gun-boats came to grief in its attack on the small fort at 
the Pass and got no further. The next attempt was by way of the 
Rio Grande. Brownsville was taken in November, 1863, and forces 
were pushed along the coast and up the river to cut off communica¬ 
tion with Mexico; for there was some fear of French intervention 
from that quarter. The next spring all these garrisons except those 
at Matagorda and Brownsville were withdrawn and Banks made a 
third attempt by way of the Red River and Shreveport. He was 
defeated at Mansfield before reaching the Texas line. In March, 
1864, Colonel E. J. Davis, a Unionist refugee from Texas, with a 
force of some two hundred Texan Unionists, was defeated in an ex¬ 
pedition against Laredo. In return, a force of Texans under Colonel 
John S. Ford advanced against and recaptured Brownsville, July 30, 
1864. Near here, at Palmito Ranch, occurred the last battle of the 
war, May 13, 1865, in which Ford defeated a body of eight hundred 
Federals. From their prisoners the victors learned that their gov¬ 
ernment had fallen and that the war was over. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII 


TEXAS FROM THE FALL OF THE CONFEDERACY TO 
THE BEGINNING OF RECONSTRUCTION 

By Charles W. Ramsdell 

[From The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, XI, 199- 
219. Read: Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 
210-223.] 


I. Conditions on the Eve of the Break-Up 

When General Lee surrendered, in early April, 1865, that part 
of the Confederacy east of the Mississippi was already overwhelmed 
and exhausted. In the Trans-Mississippi Department, however, a 
large area comprising western Louisiana, parts of Arkansas, and the 
whole of Texas was still almost untouched by invasion. The Federal 
forces having been kept at bay here through the war, it seemed prob¬ 
able that a severe struggle would be necessary for the reduction of 
the Confederates in this region; yet, within six weeks from the sur¬ 
render at Appomattox the Trans-Mississippi Department presented 
a scene of universal disorder and confusion nothing short of anarchy 
—and that, too, without the advance of a single Federal soldier. In 
reality the defences of this department, and particularly of Texas, 
with which we are here concerned, formed simply a thin shell incapable 
of sustaining any heavy or prolonged attack. 

In spite of peculiar advantages Texas had already shown unmis¬ 
takable signs of exhaustion. Throughout the war she had suffered 
less than her sister States, and during the first two or three years 
had been fairly prosperous. She lay outside the circle of conflict, 
no hostile armies laid waste her towns and fields, nor withdrew her 
slaves from the plantations. Good crops were raised every year. Dur¬ 
ing most of the time her ports were open and steamers and blockade 
runners made their way to and from Vera Cruz, Havana and the ports 
of Europe. Moreover, the Mexican border offered peculiar advan¬ 
tages for a safe overland trade; and through this channel the staples 
of Texas—cotton, wool, and hides—were exported and exchanged 
for necessary supplies or specie. Through the deflection of trade from 
its regular channels this traffic had for the most part fallen into the 
hands of speculators,—doubly hated as a class that reaped large profits 
from the danger and distress of the country while enjoying at the 

490 


CONFEDERACY TO RECONSTRUCTION 


491 


same time exemption from military service. The opportunities for 
profits in this trade were not neglected by the State and Confederate 
governments, and during the last two years of the war a State mil¬ 
itary board and a cotton bureau had charge of the exportation and 
sale of cotton and other products belonging to the State and to the 
Confederacy respectively, and imported in return munitions, medi¬ 
cines, and other military supplies. That there was much fraud and 
mismanagement in the whole cotton business, official and private, 
seems certain; there was no doubt of it at all in the minds of the 
people of that day. 

But other causes than the fraudulent operations of private and 
official speculators hastened the exhaustion of the State. Repeated 
issues of Confederate paper money had driven out all other currency 
and the paper itself steadily depreciated. By March, 1865, even this 
was cut off, as there was no ready or safe communication with the 
Confederate seat of government. Taxes were extremely heavy; the 
tithe of the cotton taken by the Confederacy was increased to a fifth, 
then to a half; everything was levied upon. Military authorities im¬ 
pressed beef, corn, and other supplies for the army, and having no 
money wherewith to pay, gave worthless certificates of indebtedness 
which the government would not even receive in payment of taxes. 
Driven on by its dire necessities the government had adopted desper¬ 
ate and oppressive regulations that destroyed its own credit and 
threatened the extinction of what little trade had survived in the 
State. During the spring of 1865 other troubles had come. A threat¬ 
ened attack by the Federals on Brownsville, the chief cotton depot, 
had diverted the export trade to the less exposed but less profitable 
and less satisfactory points on the upper Rio Grande. At the same 
time there was a serious drop in the price of cotton, a foreshadow¬ 
ing doubtless of the fall of the Confederacy. All trade was coming 
to a standstill. Although the crops had been good in 1864, they could 
not be marketed. There was plenty to eat, but there was very little 
else to be had. 

The military outlook reflected the gloom of material conditions. 
There were probably about fifty thousand men in the Trans-Mississippi 
Department when Lee surrendered. A large part of these were in 
Louisiana near the department headquarters at Shreveport. Several 
thousand were in Arkansas. Possibly fifteen thousand men were 
under arms in Texas. Of these last some three thousand were at 
Galveston with others near by at Houston. Small forces were sta¬ 
tioned at Brownsville, San Antonio, Hempstead, Sabine Pass, 
Marshall, and other points. All of these soldiers had for months 
been serving practically without pay, for they were paid in paper. 
They were poorly clad, and often had to furnish their own clothing 
and equipment. There was much discontent in the army because of 
alleged mismanagement and peculation in the commissary and supply 


492 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


departments. Swarms of deserters made their way into Mexico to 
Matamoras or took refuge with a body of Federals on the island of 
Santiago de Brazos. The conscript laws had become more and more 
severe, and young boys and old men were forced into the ranks. The 
discontent increased. Some regiments were unmanageable. 

The people were plainly growing weary of the burdens of a hope¬ 
less war. Sherman’s march through Georgia, despite the ingenious 
explanations of the press, had shown the utter impossibility of ulti¬ 
mate success. Even General E. Kirby Smith, commander of the de¬ 
partment, sought timely provision for the future as early as February 
ist, when he offered his military services to Maximilian in case of 
the overthrow of the Confederacy. Nevertheless, when the news of 
Lee’s surrender reached Texas in the latter part of April, it produced 
consternation. While it was discredited and denied at first as a 
“Yankee rumor,” then too fully confirmed, hope was held out still that 
most of the army had escaped and were with Johnston. Anxiously 
tidings were awaited from this general. There was a widespread belief 
that he was about to cross the Mississippi and join with Kirby Smith. 
Then came the crushing news of his surrender to Sherman. The 
next attack of the Federals would be upon Texas. All was gloom 
and anxiety. 

A desperate effort was made to preserve a bold front. Governor 
Murrah and Generals Smith and Magruder made speeches and issued 
stirring addresses urging the soldiers to fight to the last. Patriotic 
editors demonstrated conclusively that it would be impossible for the 
Federals to invade Texas and maintain themselves in its vast stretches 
without a year’s preparation; and that meanwhile help could be se¬ 
cured from abroad, or at least better terms would be offered than 
had been granted Lee and Johnston. Everywhere public meetings 
were held and citizens pledged themselves never to submit to Northern 
tyranny or to abandon the cause of the South. Meetings of a similar 
nature were held in the army in the effort to revive the waning devo¬ 
tion of the discontented and the disheartened. Most of these army 
meetings were meagerly attended; many of the men held aloof while 
others attended in order to pass resolutions expressing withering con¬ 
tempt for the war meetings of “exempts and details,” and bitter hatred 
of the cotton speculators, upon whom they placed the blame for the 
failure of the war. But meetings and speeches and valiant “last ditch” 
resolutions were all in vain. The majority of the soldiers were con¬ 
vinced that the war was over because it was so evidently hopeless. 
The accummulated discontent of the past month expressed itself in 
desertion. Magruder declared as early as April 29 that the men at 
Galveston were deserting by tens and twenties every night. 

In the meantime by order of Grant, General Pope had despatched 
Colonel Sprague to Shreveport to demand of Kirby Smith the sur¬ 
render of the Trans-Mississippi Department upon the same terms that 


CONFEDERACY TO RECONSTRUCTION 


493 


were granted to Lee. Smith, immediately, May 9, rejected these, 
hoping to obtain more liberal terms. With a view to determining upon 
methods and means of resistance or suitable conditions of surrender, 
he had just before this summoned to meet him in conference at 
Marshall, Governor Allen of Louisiana, Murrah of Texas, Reynolds 
of Missouri, and Flanigan of Arkansas. All attended save Murrah, 
who was ill, but who sent Colonel Guy M. Bryan of his staff to 
represent him. It was determined to endeavor to secure more favor¬ 
able terms, and meanwhile to concentrate the forces of the department 
at Houston to resist an expected attack upon Galveston. On May 
13 the members of the conference drew up a set of terms which they 
ventured to demand, hoping to preserve the political integrity of their 
States. In substance these demands were: That officers and soldiers 
were to be allowed to return directly to their homes; immunity was to 
be guaranteed against prosecution for offences committed against the 
United States during the war; officers, soldiers, and citizens were to 
be allowed to retain their arms and to leave the country if they so 
desired; the existing State governments were to be recognized until 
conventions could be called “to settle all questions between the 
States”; 1 and after a certain date each State should be allowed full 
military authority within its own borders for the preservation of order. 
This conference at Marshall is notable more for what it hoped for 
than for what it accomplished. General Pope had already expressly 
disclaimed any authority to settle political questions. Nevertheless, 
Sprague, who had been detailed for this purpose, now returned to 
Pope bearing these demands and a letter from Smith urging reasons 
for their acceptance, which were chiefly the expense of prolonging 
the war and the possibility of “foreign complications.” The Con¬ 
federate authorities had already spent much vain effort in endeavor¬ 
ing to entangle Maximilian and the French in Mexico in an imbroglio 
with the United States. On May 2 Smith had made a last attempt 
to arouse the anxiety of the Mexican emperor at the prospect of 
having the distinctly hostile power of the United States re-established 
on the Rio Grande. But such hopes were futile, if indeed Smith 
expected any realization of them. 

II. The Break-Up and the Surrender 

Hardly was the Marshall conference concluded and the counter¬ 
demand for terms despatched to Pope when Magruder sent word 
from Houston that, on the night of the 14th of May, four hundred 
of the troops at Galveston had attempted to desert the post with arms 

1 An expression which betrays the strong “States’ rights” feeling of the con¬ 
ferees. Any suggestion of the authority of the national government over the 
States was carefully avoided. The chief “question” involved was, of course, 
the continuance of slavery. 


494 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


in their hands, but had been persuaded by Colonel Ashbel Smith, 
aided by a couple of other regiments, to remain a while longer. The 
troops were all becoming unmanageable, Magruder further reported; 
they had lost their fighting spirit and could not be depended upon. 
They insisted upon dividing the public property before leaving, and 
he thought it best to comply with this demand and to try to send 
them away to their homes as quietly as possible. Almost immediately 
came similar reports from Brownsville. The commander at that place 
reported that at least one-half of his troops had deserted because they 
thought it was of no use to fight longer, and that war meetings and 
speeches had no effect upon them. The troops that remained could 
not be depended upon. Similar accounts came from other points. In 
many places the soldiers had taken possession of the government 
stores, sacked them, carried off what they could, and gone home. 

The situation was fast becoming desperate, indeed. Without wait¬ 
ing for a response from Pope, Smith immediately despatched Gen¬ 
eral Buckner as commissioner to General Canby, commanding the 
United States forces at New Orleans, to take up again the question 
of terms of surrender. He then ordered the evacuation of Galveston 
and, preparing to concentrate the Texas troops at Houston, he re¬ 
moved his headquarters thither. Before he arrived, about May 29, 
his army had disappeared. The long dreaded break-up had come. 

The order for the evacuation of Galveston had been received on 
Sunday, May 21, and the movement began the next day. The troops 
perceived that the end had come and at once became unmanageable. 
Ranks were broken and almost the whole force swarmed up to Hous¬ 
ton. Here a few men of De Bray’s brigade maintained sufficient dis¬ 
cipline to patrol the streets and preserve order. The city authorities 
were greatly alarmed, for wild rumors had flown about that the troops 
had threatened to sack and burn the town, and arrangements were 
hurriedly made by the mayor and citizens to feed them until they 
could be passed on through. Saloons were ordered closed, and the 
disobedient suffered confiscation and destruction of all liquors. For 
some reason the military patrol was suddenly withdrawn early in 
the morning of Tuesday, the 23rd. By 8 o’clock a crowd of some two 
thousand persons had collected before the doors of the Ordnance 
Building. It was broken into and speedily sacked. The mob then 
proceeded to the Clothing Bureau. Everything portable was taken. 
“Blankets, made-up clothing, bolts of domestic, buttons, flannels, shoes, 
mosquito bars, gray cloth, sides of leather, mule whips, hammers, 
head stalls, etc., all went into the division and were accepted as new 
issue.” Soldiers, citizens, women, negroes, and children participated. 
Some of the soldiers held aloof. The crowd was surprisingly quiet, 
and by 12 o’clock it was all over. The city authorities seemed par¬ 
alyzed with fear. Later in the day other troops arrived from Gal¬ 
veston and finding the booty gone angrily threatened to pillage the 


CONFEDERACY TO RECONSTRUCTION 


495 


town; but some of the citizens produced part of the stores and they 
were redistributed among the late comers. Hastily the mayor made 
provision for feeding them. Again a patrol, partly of soldiers, partly 
of citizens, was placed over the city and within a few days quiet was 
thoroughly restored. 

As the disbanded soldiery swept on homeward up through the 
State similar scenes, on a lesser scale, occurred in many places. There 
had been no personal violence at Houston, nor was there elsewhere 
for a time. The soldiers simply took possession of Confederate, and 
generally of State, property wherever they could find it, alleging that 
as it had originally been collected for their use and, as they had pro¬ 
tected it, they were the nearest heirs of the defunct Confederacy and 
entitled to this much of the estate. 

Added to this was the irritating conviction that while they had 
suffered hardships in the army they had not been adequately sup¬ 
ported by the mass of those who had been allowed to remain at 
home, and that the resources of the country had been speculated upon 
and wasted by the incompetent or unprincipled men into whose hands 
they had fallen. 

Nor did public opinion often condemn them. It was generally felt 
that the soldiers had a better right to the Confederate property than 
any one else. Private property was generally respected, but that of 
the State frequently suffered. At La Grange the soldiers of Fayette 
county held a meeting on May 27 and appointed a committee to gather 
up all government property in the county and distribute it, looking 
especially to the interest of indigent soldiers or their families. At 
Huntsville they levied upon penitentiary cloth, and for a time a fixed 
amount was given to each applicant. The towns through which they 
passed, usually in squads, furnished them food—“they are masters 
of the situation,” explains the Huntsville Item significantly. As they 
penetrated farther into the interior of the State they became more 
reckless. At La Grange and at San Antonio stores were openly 
pillaged. 

Governor Murrah, in an effort to save State property, issued a 
proclamation on the 25th to all sheriffs and other officers, enjoining 
them to gather up and preserve for future and more equitable dis¬ 
tribution all property of the State and that of the Confederacy in 
which the State had an interest. It was impossible for this order 
to be very generally carried out. The widespread feeling of insecurity 
and tendency to disorder were not lessened by the presence of bodies 
of armed men marching towards Mexico. General Joe Shelby with 
a force estimated variously from three thousand to twelve thousand 
men was on his way to join Maximilian, and levied upon the country 
as he passed along. Numbers of smaller groups, composed largely of 
late officials who had elected political exile, were bound for the same 
destination. 


496 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Governor Murrah had, on May 27, issued a call for a special ses¬ 
sion of the Legislature in July, and at the same time he proclaimed 
an election for a general convention. The program seems to have 
been “to adopt the speediest mode of harmonizing the State govern¬ 
ment with the new condition of affairs, to repeal the ordinance of 
secession, and to enact other legislation necessary to render Texas a 
faithful member of the Union.” Neither the Legislature nor the 
convention ever met. It was soon apparent that civil officials would 
not be recognized by the Federal authorities. Helpless in the midst 
of the general disorder, from the highest to the lowest, they gradually 
ceased to attempt to perform their functions. In the absence of re¬ 
sponsible authorities lawlessness increased. Jayhawkers, guerrillas, and 
highwaymen appeared. An attempt was made to capture and rob the 
penitentiary at Huntsville. The State Treasury at Austin, left with¬ 
out adequate protection, was looted. Predatory bands of robbers and 
jayhawkers infested all the roads between San Antonio and the Rio 
Grande. One stage was said to have been held up on an average 
of once every five miles on the road from Rio Grande City to San 
Antonio. Affairs were not much better in other sections. Here and 
there the towns began to organize local police or “home guards” and 
to clear the country round about. The newspapers besought the 
people to restore order, as it was the only way by which to obviate the 
establishment of a military government. 

Amid this scene of confusion Kirby Smith arrived in Houston 
about May 29. On the 30th he issued an address to the soldiers 
in which he declared that it had been his intention to concentrate 
the army at Houston, await negotiations and carry on the struggle 
until favorable terms could be secured. He was now left a com¬ 
mander without an army and, by destroying their organization, he 
declared, the men had thrown away their only chance of securing 
honorably terms. On the same day he addressed a letter to Colonel 
Sprague of General Pope’s staff, saying that the Trans-Mississippi 
Department was now open to occupation by United States troops, 
since the Confederate soldiers had disbanded. At the same time he 
declared his intention of leaving the country. In the meantime his 
commissioner to New Orleans, General Buckner, had been discussing 
terms of surrender with General Canby. Buckner failed to secure the 
settlement of any political question, since Canby was not authorized 
to treat upon those matters. However, a convention was finally agreed 
upon, May 26, providing, in substance, that the Confederate troops, 
officers, and men were to be paroled, and to return home, transporta¬ 
tion being furnished them where possible. All Confederate property 
was to be turned over to the proper officers of the government of the 
United States. 

Before General Smith had arrived at Houston, General Magruder 
and Governor Murrah had made an independent effort to secure 


CONFEDERACY TO RECONSTRUCTION 


497 


favorable terms of peace for Texas. On May 24, the next day after 
the sack of the military stores at Houston, they appointed Colonel 
Ashbel Smith and W. P. Ballinger as special commissioners to pro¬ 
ceed to New Orleans and negotiate with General Canby or other proper 
authority of the United States for “the cessation of hostilities between 
the United States and Texas.” 

The commissioners arrived at New Orleans on May 29 and at 
once solicited a conference. They had seen in the newspapers a copy 
of the convention between Canby and Buckner, but hoped “to facilitate 
the prompt and satisfactory restoration of relations between Texas 
and the United States government.” Canby granted the conference, 
but distinctly stated that he had no authority to entertain officially 
any questions of civil or political character. The Texas commissioners 
frankly stated at the outset the actual conditions in Texas—the mutiny 
and the break-up in the army, the seizure and distribution of Con¬ 
federate property, the helplessness of the Confederate officials. The 
people, they said, were heartily tired of the war and ready in good 
faith to return to their allegiance to the government of the United 
States; but they were greatly concerned with respect to the course to 
be pursued by the national government. The commissioners sug¬ 
gested that, inasmuch as the machinery of the civil government of the 
State was still intact and the regular election of State officers under 
the constitution in force in i860 was to fall due the next August, 
citizens of proven loyalty to the Union be allowed to proceed with 
this election. It would be a good policy to recognize the existing 
State government as a government de facto in preference to establish¬ 
ing a military government. They also pointed out the great evils to 
be feared from the dislocation of the labor of the State. There was 
more cotton in Texas than elsewhere, the crop was far along toward 
maturity, and its production involved the interest of all, white and 
black. It was of the greatest importance, therefore, that the negroes 
should be kept on the farms, and iti was suggested that they be paid 
wages under proper regulations until the whole subject of labor could 
be properly adjusted. 

This conference was necessarily fruitless, for not only was Canby 
without authority to treat upon the subjects broached by the Texans, 
but the United States authorities were not likely to yield on a matter 
of such wide importance as even the partial recognition of the “rebel” 
State government. As the final effort of the State authorities to save 
something from the wreck, it is interesting; but it seems impossible 
that, knowing the outcome of the Sherman-Johnston treaty, they could 
have hoped for very much along this line. 

On June 2 General Smith went on board a United States ship of 
war at Galveston and formally signed the Canby-Buckner convention. 
The last vestige of Confederate military authority now vanished. For 
three weeks, however, after the surrender, the Federals were not able 


498 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

to send an army to take possession of Texas because of the lack of 
transports. 

Meanwhile conditions in the State grew worse. Wild rumors 
were afloat of dire punishments to be inflicted upon prominent rebels 
by the victorious Yankees. Trials for treason before military com¬ 
missions and wholesale confiscation of property were to be expected. 
A sort of panic seized upon many of those who had held office under 
the Confederacy. Others declared they could not live under the odious 
rule of their enemies and prepared to emigrate. A lively exodus to 
Mexico ensued. Among those to go were the highest officials in the 
State, Generals Smith and Magruder and Governors Clark and Mur- 
rah. This flight was bitterly resented by those who were left behind. 

On May 29 General Sheridan was assigned to the command of 
the Military Division of the Southwest, headquarters at New Orleans. 
On June 10 he ordered General Gordon Granger to proceed with 
eighteen hundred men to Galveston. 2 Granger arrived at Galveston 
on June 19 and immediately, in conformity to instructions, assumed 
command of all forces in the State and issued orders declaring that 
by proclamation of the President all slaves were free, that all acts 
of the Governor and the Legislature of Texas since the ordinance of 
secession were illegal, that all officers and men of the late Confederate 
army were to be paroled, and that all persons “having in their posses¬ 
sion public property of any description, formerly belonging to the late 
so-called Confederate States or the State of Texas,” should turn it 
over to the proper United States officer at the nearest of the previously 
designated stations. 3 As rapidly as possible troops were pushed into 
the interior of the State and posted at the most important points. 
The military were to serve the double purpose of carrying out the 
provisions of the surrender and of preserving order until a civil gov¬ 
ernment could be established. Most of the troops sent to Texas were 
ordered to the Rio Grande as a sort of demonstration against the 
French in Mexico. The rest were wholly inadequate to the efficient 
policing of the State. The posts established were widely separated 
and extensive districts, comprising sometimes several counties, were 
without proper surveillance; and this, too, at a time when society was 
convulsed with sudden and momentous changes and lawlessness was 
everywhere. Even under these conditions General Sheridan, to pro- 

2 Sheridan says in the dispatch: “There is not a very wholesome state of 
affairs in Texas. The Governor and all the soldiers and the people generally 
are disposed to be ugly, and the sooner Galveston can be occupied the better” 

(Official Records, War of Rebellion, Series I, Vol. XLVIII, Part II, 841). If 
by this it was meant that further resistance to Federal authority was contem¬ 
plated, there seems to be absolutely nothing to support his statement. On the 
other hand, there was widespread disorder and lawlessness, but the reference 
could hardly have been to that. 

3 These were Houston, Galveston, Bonham, San Antonio, Marshall, and 
Brownsville. 


CONFEDERACY TO RECONSTRUCTION 


499 


vide against local resistance or guerrilla warfare, issued orders, June 
30, that no home guards or bands for self-protection would be al¬ 
lowed anywhere in the State, on the ground that the military were 
sufficient for all such purposes. By the same order, neighborhoods 
infested by guerrillas were to be held responsible for the deeds of the 
latter,—an act characteristic of the harsh suspicion with which Sher¬ 
idan always regarded Texas. 

The military authorities now proceeded to confiscate all public 
property that could be found. Such as had belonged to the Con¬ 
federacy or had been used in the prosecution of the war became the 
property of the United States, while that belonging solely to the State 
was held until the proper time should arrive for turning it over to 
the State officials. But very little of the public property had been left 
by the soldiers during the riotous days of the “break-up,” and the 
Federais charged that the Confederate officials had not observed the 
terms of the convention and their parole. These charges, later re¬ 
iterated, were undoubtedly unjust, for the soldiers had seized most of 
the property before the surrender, and afterwards the officers were 
unable to restrain them. Many commands, in fact, had never sur¬ 
rendered, but simply disbanded, as has been shown, even before the 
convention had been agreed upon at New Orleans. 


III. The Cotton Troubles 

But if most forms of Confederate property had disappeared or 
evaded Federal confiscation, it was otherwise with cotton. When 
the war closed there was scattered all over the country a considerable 
amount of unmarketed cotton, and as soon as hostilities ceased the 
holders were anxious to get it to market without delay in order to 
obtain the enormous prices then being paid for it. General Grant had 
given orders to the commanders in the Southwest not to interfere with 
its shipment since it was to the business interests of the whole country 
that it be marketed, and to encourage shipment in every way. The 
military were forbidden to institute inquiries as to ownership, but to 
leave it to the treasury agents to seek out such property as belonged 
to the government. Accordingly, General Granger, upon his arrival 
at Galveston, issued orders to the effect that until the arrival of treas¬ 
ury agents all cotton would be turned into the quartermaster’s depart¬ 
ment for shipment to New Orleans or New York, there to be sold 
to United States purchasing agents. Bills of lading were to be given 
and the owners were to be allowed to accompany the cotton in order 
to effect the sale. This order was in force for little more than a 
month. Treasury agents soon arrived and swarmed over the State, 
seeking out and taking possession of everything belonging to the late 
Confederacy, especially cotton. Some of this cotton had actually be- 


500 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


longed to the Confederate government; some had been set aside to pay 
the tax but had never been delivered; some had been purchased by the 
State Military Board but had never been paid for nor delivered; some 
had gone to pay State taxes and was now State property; but a great 
part had never been anything but private property. The greatest pos¬ 
sible confusion arose in regard to the ownership of these various 
classes of cotton. The planter who had produced it was unwilling 
to give up, as Confederate property, cotton that had never been paid 
for, and he still claimed it as his own; nor, it must be confessed, was 
he always active in turning over that which had actually been paid for 
(in Confederate paper), or which had been raised for the government 
under the terms of an “exemption contract.” 4 On the other hand, 
the claims of the treasury agents were sweeping. By order of the 
general agent for Texas, H. C. Wamoth, all personal property that 
was “actually or constructively in the possession of the Confederate 
States at the time of the surrender” was to be seized. In all cases 
persons who wished to ship cotton from any point in Texas were 
required to give satisfactory evidence that the cotton for shipment 
was not “surrendered” cotton. The burden of proof, therefore, was 
on the owner of the cotton. 

It is obvious that in the confusion involving the subject and in¬ 
cident to public affairs generally, it must have been no easy task even 
for the most upright and generous minded agent to keep clear of pop¬ 
ular disfavor; but the almost unlimited powers delegated to these 
agents and the constant opportunities for fraud and peculation, with 
little danger of punishment, were in themselves demoralizing. There 
seems to have been a large amount of truth in the charges of fraud, 
robbery, and extortion that were made against so many of these offi¬ 
cials. A petition to President Johnson, printed in the Washington 
Republican (Washington, D. C.), and signed by merchants, business 
men, and planters of Louisiana and Texas, declares that great frauds 
and acts of oppression were continually practiced by treasury agents 
in the matter of cotton; that the planters west of the Mississippi had 
rarely received anything in payment from the Confederate govern¬ 
ment, and had been informed by agents, military officials, and by the 
Secretary of the Treasury himself, that cotton not thus paid for or 
delivered would pass like any other cotton. Yet when the cotton 
had been sold to the merchant the treasury agent stepped in and 
took possession of it. Trade was paralyzed, capital made timid, and 
the planters were unable to sell their cotton or to hire the labor they 
needed. A correspondent of the New Orleans Picayune, writing from 
Eastern Texas, gives an account of similar difficulties, and declares 
that every agent under whose inspection the cotton passed required 

4 An arrangement whereby a planter had been granted exemption from mili¬ 
tary service upon condition of raising a certain amount of cotton, corn, or 
beef for the Confederate government. 


CONFEDERACY TO RECONSTRUCTION 


501 


new proof, which was always inconvenient to obtain. Several cases 
of fraud came to light at Jefferson, Texas, where a treasury agent 
was later indicted on three distinct charges of fraud and swindling. 
He was released by the military authorities. Usually there was no 
recourse whatever for the parties claiming to have been wronged. 
A favorite device of the dishonest treasury agent was to hold back 
a lot of cotton from shipment under pretense of investigating the 
title until the owner was willing to give a bribe for its release. Some¬ 
times he took possession of the cotton outright and shipped it on his 
own account. At other times he ordered it shipped to certain points 
at high rates and received a rebate on the transportation charges. 

These troubles involved only the cotton left over from the crop 
of 1864, but so slowly was that crop marketed that they did not cease 
until the beginning of 1866. 

IV. The Negro Question and Labor Conditions 

The turmoil and confusion of the “break-up” and the general 
dread of all that a military occupation might entail had at first diverted 
public attention somewhat from the most serious problem that the 
close of the war had forced upon the people of the South. What was 
to be done with the negro? Was he to be set free, and if so, what 
measure of freedom should he have? How was his labor to be 
secured and so regulated that he should be an economically efficient 
member of society? What was to be his position in this society, 
in the broad domain of civil rights and privileges, and in political 
affairs? The magnitude of the problem was not at once appreciated; 
for the time being public attention was engaged solely with that 
part which was of most immediate concern, the measure of freedom 
to be accorded to the late slaves and the best method of securing 
his labor. The other and more intricate phases of the question were 
of later development, and the contingencies which gave rise to them 
were then but dimly apprehended. 

It had been long foreseen that in the event of Federal victory 
a change in the status of the negro would be inevitable. Indeed, 
the certainty of his emancipation in case of the failure of the South 
had been wielded as a goad to a “last ditch” struggle. Yet the Con¬ 
federacy itself, in final desperation proposed to grant freedom to 
the slaves as a reward for military service. The plan came to noth¬ 
ing, for the Confederate government was then on the point of col¬ 
lapse. Then, too, slavery as a system had already been shattered 
east of the Mississippi by the presence of the Federal armies. In 
Texas, however, undisturbed by invasions, the institution had remained 
essentially unimpaired. But with the break-up of the Confederate 
armies and the approach of the Federals the changed status of the 
negro was now sharply emphasized. Long before Granger's procla- 


502 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


mation at Galveston, June 19, it was generally known that the slaves 
would be freed. In some cases the planters anticipated the emanci¬ 
pation by setting their negroes at liberty; sometimes the negroes them¬ 
selves slipped away from their homes and began roaming about the 
country; but for the most part they were kept at home to await 
Federal action. 

Even at this time, despite the attitude of the national authori¬ 
ties, there was considerable belief that slavery as an institution was 
not dead nor yet doomed to die. The Marshall Republican, the most 
important weekly of Eastern Texas, in its issue of June 16, reviewed 
the situation, describing the demoralization of the negroes, who were 
lapsing into vagrancy and consequent “filth, disease, and crime.” 
The negroes would not work when once it was definitely known that 
slavery was to cease, and the crops could neither be cultivated nor 
gathered. The Republican affected to believe that “the ruinous ef¬ 
fects” of freeing four millions of ignorant and helpless blacks would 
not be confined to the South, but that the blight would be communi¬ 
cated to the North, and that “the time would come when the people 
of that section would be glad to witness a return to a system attended 
with more philanthropy and happiness to the black race than the one 
they seem determined at present to establish; for they will find that 
compulsory labor affords larger crops and a richer market for Yankee 
manufacturers.” The masters were advised, therefore, not to turn 
their slaves loose to become demoralized, but to maintain a kind and 
protecting care over them. “The amendment to the Federal Consti¬ 
tution abolishing slavery has not been ratified by three-fourths of the 
States, nor is it likely to be in the ensuing ten years. When the 
State governments, therefore, are reorganized it is more than prob¬ 
able that slavery will be perpetuated. We can tell better then than 
at present how long it is likely to endure and prepare for the change.” 
Emancipation, if adopted at all, should bq gradual, but “there is but 
little reason to doubt that whether or not slavery is perpetuated in 
name, there will be a return to a character of compulsory labor which 
will make the negro useful to society and subordinate to the white 
race.” The Houston Telegraph, while conceding that emancipation 
was “certain to take place,” was of the opinion that paid compulsory 
labor would replace unpaid. Since the negro was to be freed by the 
Federal government solely with a view to the safety of the nation, 
his condition would be modified only so far as to insure this, but not 
so far as materially to weaken the agricultural resources of the 
country. Therefore, the negroes would be compelled to work under 
police regulations of a stringent character. Under this happy system 
insolence was to be provided against on the one hand and injustice 
on the other. 

Such seem to have been the hopes of the well informed. To 
men accustomed to dealing with the indolence of the negro in slavery, 


CONFEDERACY TO RECONSTRUCTION 


503 


such a thing as successful free negro labor was absolutely unthink' 
able. No other than negro labor seemed available on the great bot¬ 
tom farms of the “black belt”; without this labor the planting interests 
were threatened with ruin; and, moreover, to leave the negro the 
prey of the vice and misery certain to result from idleness and 
vagrancy would be criminal. Compulsory negro labor, then, seemed 
the natural and necessary arrangement. It was clear enough, too, that 
slavery as an institution, recognized by the constitution, could not 
be abolished by proclamation, and that three-fourths of the States 
would adopt an amendment abolishing slavery seemed preposterous. 
Thus the life-long beliefs and prejudices of the Southerner conspired 
with the exigencies of the situation to lead him into a policy which, 
certain to be distorted in reports given to the North, was in its reaction 
to force upon him the very things he would have feared most,— 
his own disfranchisement and negro domination. 

Serenely unconscious of negro incapacity and unembarrassed by 
constitutional guarantees, the Federal military authorities proceeded 
to complete the work cut out for them. In his emancipation procla¬ 
mation, issued at Galveston on the 19th of June, General Granger 
declared that in accordance with the presidential proclamation all 
slaves were free, and that this involved an absolute equality of per¬ 
sonal and property rights between former masters and slaves, the 
previous connection between them becoming that between employer 
and free laborer. Mindful of the propensities of the freedmen, he 
advised them to remain at home and work for wages, and warned 
them that they would not be allowed to collect at military posts, nor 
would they be supported in idleness there or elsewhere. 

As long as the regular army officials were in control, that is, until 
the officials of the Freedmen’s Bureau arrived, efforts were made to 
keep the negroes under strict supervision. In the published general 
orders of post commanders at various points during June and July, 
Granger’s proclamation is reflected—the freedmen are repeatedly 
urged to stay at home and go to work for their former masters for 
wages; they are assured of their freedom and of protection from 
injustice, but are warned against vagrancy under penalty of being 
put to hard labor without compensation; and in many cases they are 
not permitted to travel on the public thoroughfares without passes 
from employers. That the army officials failed to keep the negroes 
from vagrancy is not surprising. The army posts were too far apart 
to keep all communities under surveillance, and the freedmen them¬ 
selves were too ignorant to understand that their new freedom did 
not mean immunity from work, and that they could not be fed and 
clothed forever by their liberators. 

The military officials made no effort at first to superintend the 
drawing up of contracts between the freedman and his employer, 
nor to act for the freedmen in stipulating wages or other terms. The 


504 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

provost marshal general for Texas, Lieutenant-Colonel Laughlin, 
issued a statement that negroes would be allowed to make contracts 
with whomsoever they wished, and that both parties would be held 
to the terms of the contract; that “unless other regulations are pro¬ 
mulgated by the Freedman’s Bureau,” the amount and kind of con¬ 
sideration for labor should be entirely a matter of contract between 
the employer and the employees. Perhaps it would have been better 
if the rate of wages had been fixed in some way, for some contracts 
were practically nullified later by the Bureau. It had frequently 
happened that a planter, not feeling able to pay wages,—for ready 
cash was scarce, political conditions unsettled, and the outlook un¬ 
certain,—had arranged for his freedman to work temporarily for food 
and clothing, for himself and family. In most cases the freedman 
was to receive a part of the crop in the fall. To the childlike negro, 
concerned only with the immediate present, there was no difference 
between this and his old condition as a slave, and he soon wished to 
leave. 

From a few sections the reports were favorable—the blacks were 
making contracts and remaining at work; but as the summer wore 
on complaints came from all sides that vagrancy, theft, vice, and 
insolence were increasing, and that where negroes had made contracts 
they broke them without cause, often leaving their families for their 
employers to feed. The Houston Telegraph thought it necessary 
to warn the people not to allow themselves to develop a feeling of 
hostility and bitterness toward the blacks, who, although they were 
doing very many foolish and vexatious things, were “not responsible 
for their own emancipation.” It would have been well if the whites 
generally could have shown this tolerant spirit; but for his former 
master to show indulgence to the freedman who broke his contract 
when it suited his whim, disobeyed orders just to see how it felt 
to be “free,” and spent most of his time “visiting around” when the 
crops were most in need of work, was more than could be con¬ 
fidently expected of the average employer. For the time being, for¬ 
tunately, in the southern part of the State, where the demoralization 
was worst, the crops were already well advanced and would need but 
little attention until fall. In the north and northeast, where the 
Federal troops had not yet penetrated, the negroes had shown less 
inclination to wander about, or else their former masters had taken 
steps to keep them at home. While in a few instances these planters 
endeavored to keep their negroes in ignorance of their freedom, in 
most cases their efforts took the form of combinations among ex¬ 
slave holders to control the labor of their former slaves; and usually 
each planter agreed to hire no negro without the consent of his for¬ 
mer master. Sometimes freedmen who broke contracts and went 
away were brought back by force, and in some cases the planters 
were guilty of needless cruelty. The army officials generally en- 


CONFEDERACY TO RECONSTRUCTION 


505 


deavored to hold the negroes to their contracts, but at the same time 
they refused to allow coercion on the part of employers. 

The discontent grew steadily worse and found expression in a 
more and more insistent demand, chiefly on the part of planters 
and newspapers in the interior, for State regulation of black labor. 
The Telegraph alone pointed out that the “North would not likely 
allow the South thus to enjoy the fruit of the contest over slavery 
after having lost the contest,” and advocated securing the immigra¬ 
tion of white labor. 

Conditions in the black belt did not materially improve during 
the summer. There was much uneasiness because of persistent 
rumors that negro troops were to be sent to Texas for garrison duty; 
for it was generally felt that their presence could only aggravate the 
situation and might make it positively dangerous by inciting unruly 
negroes to lawlessness and precipitating racial disturbances. It was 
also known that the Freedmen’s Bureau was to be established in 
Texas, and the anxiety and distrust that were felt as to its attitude 
on the labor question did not tend to alleviate the growing discontent. 
Public opinion had become skeptical of the ability of the army officials 
to provide the usual and necessary supply of black labor, and mani¬ 
fested a greater eagerness for the speedy restoration of the regular 
State government which could be expected to deal with the problem 
in a manner agreeable with the customs and social ideas of the 
people. For this reason, largely, the arrival of the newly appointed 
provisional Governor, A. J. Hamilton, who came to restore civil 
authority and set in motion again the machinery of State govern¬ 
ment, was greeted with expectant interest. 


CHAPTER XXXIX 

THE RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD, 1865-1874 

By Dudley G. Wooten 

[This selection is from Wooten, A Complete History of Texas, Chapter 
XXIV (Dallas, 1899). See: Ramsdell, “Texas from the Fall of the Con¬ 
federacy to the Beginning of Reconstruction” (in the preceding chapter) and 
“Presidential Reconstruction in Texas,” in Quarterly of the Texas State His¬ 
torical Association, XI, 199-219, 277-317; also the same author’s Reconstruc¬ 
tion in Texas, 27-318 (Columbia University Press, New York, 1910) ; Wood, 
“Reminiscences of Texas and Texans Fifty Years Ago” and “The Ku Klux 
Klan,” in the Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, V, 113—120, 
IX, 262^-268; Wheeler, “Reminiscences of Reconstruction in Texas,” in the 
same Quarterly, XI, 56-65; Roberts, “The Experience of an Unrecognized 
Senator,” in the same Quarterly, XII, 87-147. Read: Garrison, Texas, Chapter 
XXIII; Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 224-242.] 

The fall of the Confederate States was hardly assured, when the 
President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, was assassinated, 
April 14, 1865. The Vice-President, Andrew Johnson, succeeded 
him, and a serious struggle at once began in regard to the course 
to be pursued towards the States lately belonging to the Southern 
Confederacy. 

According to the political theories of the Republican party of the 
North, a State could not successfully secede, the Federal government 
being “an indestructible Union of indestructible States.” Upon this 
theory the Southern States were still in the Union, and only required 
to be reconstructed, so as to bring their governments and people into 
harmony with the changes brought about by the war. Just as the 
war was closing, Congress adopted two amendments to the Constitu¬ 
tion, one of which abolished and prohibited slavery in the United 
States, and the other practically destroyed the control of the States 
over their own citizens and affairs by creating a United States citizen¬ 
ship superior in its rights of person and property to citizenship in 
the several States. These were the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amend¬ 
ments, passed respectively in February and June, 1865, and were sup¬ 
posed to contain the practical results of the Civil War. In order for 
the amendments to become a part of the Constitution, they would 
have to be adopted or consented to by three-fourths of the States, 
and it required the votes of some of the Southern States to make 
up the necessary three-fourths. Here was a dilemma. The lately 

506 


THE RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD, 1865-1874 507 


seceding States were still in the Union, and hence had the right to 
vote on the adoption of the amendments; it was absolutely certain that, 
if those States were allowed to express their true and intelligent 
choice, they would never assent to the proposed changes, and yet it 
was necessary to secure enough of the Southern States to carry the 
amendments. What was to be done ? Reconstruction was the method 
proposed, but there was great difference of opinion as to the course 
to be pursued in reconstructing the State governments of the South. 

President Johnson determined to adopt the plan of simply punish¬ 
ing the most prominent leaders in the late war by depriving them 
of all civil rights, and then he would appoint provisional governors 
in the Southern States and invite the people of those States to call 
conventions, reorganize their governments, and resume their former 
places in the Union. This was called Presidential Reconstruction, 
and it proved a failure so far as accomplishing the purposes of the 
North was concerned. The Southern States had never been without 
their regular constitutional government; there had been no destruc¬ 
tion of their usual republican forms of government requiring to be 
reconstructed, and hence, when they were forced by military power 
to carry out the President’s plan of reorganization, they simply re¬ 
enacted their former laws and constitutions and remained the same 
States they had always been, and unanimously opposed to the Thir¬ 
teenth and Fourteenth Amendments. This was inevitable, and it was 
right and proper, if the theory of the Northern statesmen was correct, 
that the seceding States had never left the Union. But it did not 
serve the end the North had in view in waging the war. To carry 
out the Republican ideas of government, the negro must be freed 
and clothed with all civil and political rights as a citizen of the United 
States, and a new definition of citizenship must be made, so as to 
give the Federal government power to override the States in enforcing 
the newly created rights of the recent slaves. Presidential Recon¬ 
struction evidently would not accomplish the purpose, and so Congress, 
ruled by the most violent of the radical Republicans, took hold of 
the matter in 1867 and 1868. 

Congressional Reconstruction , as the methods pursued by Congress 
were called, consisted in placing the Southern States under the abso¬ 
lute and arbitrary control of the military power, disfranchising enough 
of the intelligent white citizens who had taken part in the war to 
place the Union men and negroes in the majority, and then adopting 
such State Constitutions and laws as would force upon the people 
the adoption of the amendments and the doctrines and institutions of 
the Northern Republicans. And it must be remembered that all these 
reconstruction measures were passed through Congress while the 
Southern States had not a Senator or Representative in that body, 
notwithstanding it was constantly asserted that the Union had never 
been dissolved and that the South had not in fact seceded, 


508 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


The foregoing is necessary to be understood in order to explain 
the history of those times and to follow intelligently the course of 
events in Texas. 

After the close of hostilities in April, 1865, there was a period 
of two or three months when the State had no government of any 
kind. Soldiers were returning home, some fleeing to Mexico, and 
everything was chaos and gloom. On Jujie 19, 1865, General Gordon 
Granger, of the United States army, assumed military command over 
Texas, declared all that had been done by the State government since 
1861 null and void, and proclaimed the freedom of the negroes. In 
July, President Johnson appointed A. J. Hamilton provisional gover¬ 
nor of Texas, and he began the performance of his duties on the 
25th of that month. According to the plan of Presidential Recon¬ 
struction before explained, a State Convention was called to amend 
the Constitution and reorganize the government. It met February 
7, 1866, and adopted the Constitution of 1845, in force at the time 
of Secession in 1861, with certain amendments, thereby ignoring all 
that had been done by the Secession Convention. One of the amend¬ 
ments to the Constitution was to increase the judges of the Supreme 
Court from three to five. It was provided by the Convention that 
a general election should be held on the last Monday in June to choose 
all the State, district, and county officers, and members of the legis¬ 
lature, and for the ratification of the amendments to the State Con¬ 
stitution. Before adjourning, the conservative members of both 
parties in the Convention agreed upon James W. Throckmorton as a 
proper candidate for governor, and George W. Jones for lieutenant- 
governor. George F. Moore, Richard Coke, Stockton P. Donley, A. 
H. Willie, and George W. Smith were also agreed upon for the new 
Supreme Court judges. At the election in June, 1866, Throckmorton 
and Jones were elected, receiving about forty-nine thousand votes 
as against about twelve thousand for E. M. Pease and L. Lindsey, 
the opposing candidates, and the gentlemen above named were elected 
to the Supreme Court. 

On August 9, the legislature met, and the new State officers were 
installed. O. M. Roberts and David G. Burnet were elected United 
States Senators from Texas; and in the election held in the fall of 
1866, members of Congress from the State to the Thirty-ninth Con¬ 
gress, then in session, and to the Fortieth Congress, were chosen. 
The members elected to the Thirty-ninth Congress were George W. 
Chilton, B. H. Epperson, A. M. Branch, and C. C. Herbert, from 
the four districts in the order named; and the same gentlemen were 
also elected to the Fortieth Congress, except George W. Chilton, in 
whose stead James M. Burroughs was chosen. 

The legislature passed quite a number of needed laws for the 
protection of the frontier against Indians and to restore the prosperity 
of the State. The people were hopeful and industrious, the govern- 


THE RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD, 1865-1874 509 


ment moved smoothly, and nothing was wanting to make Texas again 
a thriving State in the Union, except the removal of the United States 
soldiers and the admission of her Senators and Representatives in 
Congress. But neither of these events happened. The new order of 
things did not suit the Republican party. The country was full of 
soldiers and Northern politicians who came with the army, and their 
influence was a continual source of trouble between the recently 
emancipated negroes and their former masters. The old Union men 
of Texas, who had opposed Secession and claimed to be the “truly 
loyal” citizens, were very much dissatisfied to see the government 
once more in the hands of the men they had resisted in 1861. There 
was much bitterness of feeling on both sides, and men’s minds were 
not favorable to a harmonious settlement of existing differences. The 
Northern Republicans who came South after the war were called 
“Carpet-baggers,” and the native Union men and Republicans were 
called “Scalawags.” These terms indicate the odium in which the 
Reconstructionists were held by the Southern people, and such epi¬ 
thets did not increase the prospect of peaceful times. 

In this condition of things, Congress took the reconstruction of 
the Southern States out of the hands of the President, and pro¬ 
ceeded to inaugurate the measures known as Congressional Recon¬ 
struction, above described. The Senators and Representatives from 
Texas, like those of the other late Confederate States, were refused 
admission to Congress. Military governments were established 
throughout the South. On March 19, 1867, General P. H. Sheridan, 
in command of the military department which included Texas, issued 
an order placing General Charles Griffin in command of the district 
of Texas. Governor Throckmorton gave such aid as was requested 
of him in carrying out the new plan of reorganization; but on July 
30, 1867, General Sheridan, by military order, removed him from the 
governorship, “as an impediment to reconstruction,” and appointed 
Elisha M. Pease in his place. All officers were removed by the mili¬ 
tary power, and their places filled with those supposed to be in sym¬ 
pathy with the methods of Congressional Reconstruction. The 
Supreme Court as thus changed consisted of E. J. Davis, C. Caldwell, 
Amos Morrill, A. H. Latimer, and Livingston Lindsey. No man 
could hold an office, or participate in any of the elections that were 
to be held, unless he could take the “Iron-Clad Oath,” as it was called. 
This oath was to the effect that the person taking it had not taken 
part in the late Rebellion, or given aid thereto; which, of course, dis¬ 
franchised nearly all the white voters in the State. The “Freed- 
men’s Bureau” was established in Texas and the other Southern States, 
—being a military court composed of United States officers, whose 
special duty it was to protect the negroes in their recently acquired 
rights, and a great many rights that they had not acquired. 

In opposition to these measures there was organized among the 


510 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Southern people what was called the “Ku-Klux Klan,” a mysterious 
secret organization, whose members would parade at night through 
the towns, on horseback and fully armed, clad in long white or black 
robes, with masks on their faces and high peaked hats,—claiming to 
be the returned spirits of dead soldiers who fell in the late war. Their 
formidable and ghostly array produced great terror among the negroes, 
and there is no doubt it had a wholesome effect to restrain an ignorant 
and deluded race of lately emancipated slaves, whose worst passions 
were being aroused by unprincipled white politicians. In some local¬ 
ities, however, in the South, the Ku-Klux and other lawless bands 
who assumed their name and garb did not confine themselves to mere 
displays of mysterious power. Many cruel outrages were perpetrated 
in their name, and the organization became a menace to the peace and 
order of society. It is not believed, however, that such lawless acts 
were ever committed to any great extent in Texas. 

A convention was called to meet at Austin, June i, 1868, to frame 
a new State Constitution, in accordance with the reconstruction meas¬ 
ures of Congress. In selecting delegates to that convention, nearly 
all the white citizens of Texas were prevented from voting by the 
“Iron-Clad Oath”; and it was understood that Governor Pease and 
those acting with him proposed to still further disfranchise the Demo¬ 
crats of the State, by unjust rules and requirements in the registration 
of voters. This called out from General Winfield S. Hancock, then 
in command of the department at New Orleans, his famous order 
and letter, in which he rebuked such an attempt, and declared that 
the legal voters of Texas must have their rights respected and their 
votes recorded. The Reconstruction Convention met at the appointed 
time. Edmund J. Davis was elected president, and the leading men 
in it were A. J. Hamilton, Morgan C. Hamilton, A. P. McCormick, 
C. Caldwell, Arvin Wright, and Lemuel D. Evans. The Hamilton 
brothers, A. J. and Morgan C., were on opposite sides in the issues 
that arose in the convention; the former being liberal and just in his 
desire to protect the men who had taken part in the war, while the 
latter was extreme and radical in the purpose to completely destroy 
their influence in the government of the State. 

The Reconstruction Convention lasted from June 1, 1868, until 
February 6, 1869, and it never did actually adjourn, nor was the Con¬ 
stitution ever finally adopted by a vote of the convention or signed 
by the members. Its proceedings were very irregular and disorderly, 
and often there was no quorum present. Many members went home 
in disgust, and one of these, a colored delegate from Galveston, Hon. 
G. T. Ruby, filed his withdrawal in the following language: “Believ¬ 
ing that the present reconstruction convention has lost, through many 
of its members, all regard for dignity and honor as a legislative 
assembly, and that its continued assemblage will only terminate in 
disgust to the entire country, I herewith tender my resignation as a 


THE RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD, 1865-1874 511 


member hereof, and as a delegate from Galveston County.” The 
Constitution framed by this body is known as the Constitution of 
1869. It lengthened the terms and increased the salaries of all officers; 
reduced the Supreme Court to three judges, and made all judicial 
officers appointive instead of elective; and required all elections to be 
held at the county seat of each county, and to last four days. The 
most meritorious features of this Constitution were the liberal pro¬ 
visions made for the public free schools. In addition to lands, bonds, 
and funds belonging to the schools under former laws, it was provided 
that all receipts from public lands in the future should go to the school 
fund, and one-fourth of the annual taxes and all of the poll-tax were 
appropriated to the schools—all to constitute a permanent fund, 
whose interest could be used to support the free-school system. A 
State superintendent of public instruction was also provided for, and 
a bureau to encourage immigration. 

While these events had been occurring in Texas, enough of the 
Southern States had been reconstructed by Congress to adopt the 
Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments, and a Fifteenth Amendment, 
allowing negroes to vote, was passed through Congress in February, 
1868, but was not ratified by three-fourths of the States until 1870. 
The right of suffrage, however, was extended to the recent slaves 
in Texas by the Constitution of 1869 an d the ordinances of the mili¬ 
tary power. In December, 1869, Governor Pease, being dissatisfied 
with the extreme measures and methods employed in reconstruction, 
resigned the office of governor, and from that time until the new 
administration came in, General J. J. Reynolds was the military gov¬ 
ernor of Texas. In the subsequent political movements in the State, 
Pease acted with the Hamilton and against the Davis party. The 
election for the State and county officers was held in November, 1869, 
and E. J. Davis was elected over A. J. Hamilton by the close vote of 
39,901 to 39,092. The Constitution was ratified by a large majority. 
J. W. Flanagan was elected lieutenant-governor. The registration 
showed the total number of voters in the State to be 135,553, of 
whom 78,648 were white and 56,905 were negroes; so that 56,56a 
voters did not participate in the election. 

Governor Davis took the oath of office January 17, 1870, for the 
four years’ term created by the new Constitution. The legislature 
met in February, adopted the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, 
and elected Morgan C. Hamilton to the United States Senate for the 
term ending March 3, 1871, and also for the term ending in 1877. 
J. W. Flanagan was elected Senator for the term ending in March, 
1875. This government was declared to be merely provisional until 
Congress should accept the new State Constitution, which it did on 
March 30, 1870, and the Twelfth Legislature met in regular session 
on April 26, 1870. 

It would be a fruitless and unpleasant task to review the details 


512 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


of the Davis administration. He was personally and socially a cour¬ 
teous and considerate gentleman, but politically he was as thoroughly 
unfitted for the head of a constitutional government in a free country 
as it is possible to imagine. His administration was one of boundless 
extravagance, disorderly and lawless despotism, increasing disregard 
of every principle of personal and political liberty, and it brought 
utter ruin to the best interests of the State and its citizens. He was 
given enormous power and patronage by the legislature, and he used 
them in the most reckless and arbitrary manner. He established a 
State police, officered by petty tyrants and composed of disreputable 
adventurers. He assumed the right to declare martial law whenever 
and wherever his authority was resisted, and he reduced whole coun¬ 
ties and districts to a state of terrorism and outlawry. Finally, the 
profligate course of public expenditures and the increase of taxes to 
the verge of confiscation aroused men of all parties to overthrow 
such a ruinous system of misrule. 

In September, 1871, a “Non-Partisan Tax-Payers’ Convention” 
was held in Austin, to protest against the abuses of the State govern¬ 
ment. Besides the prominent Democrats in the State, it contained 
such men as A. J. and Morgan C. Hamilton, Ex-Governor Pease, 
George Hancock, and many leading Republicans; and Governor Pease 
was president of the convention. That convention ascertained and 
published to the world the fact that the two legislatures of 1870 and 
1871 had appropriated for the expenses of the government the enor¬ 
mous sum of $3,752,875, besides subsidies granted to railroads amount¬ 
ing to $14,000,000; and the State and county tax was $2.1714 on each 
one hundred dollars, besides poll, occupation, and license taxes. All 
these facts being circulated among the people, as well as the many 
acts of Governor Davis in violation of the Constitution and laws, a 
revolution in public sentiment began to take place. No election for 
members of the legislature was held until November, 1872; but the 
Thirteenth Legislature, which met in January, 1873, had a majority 
in both houses opposed to Governor Davis. It proceeded to repeal 
many objectionable laws, and it set aside the grant of $6,000,000 to the 
Texas and Pacific Railroad Company, substituting lands therefor, 
as had always been the policy of the State. 

A general State election was held in November, 1873, the old 
method of voting by precincts and on one day only having been 
restored by the Democratic legislature. Richard Coke and R. B. 
Hubbard were the Democratic candidates for governor and lieutenant- 
governor, against E. J. Davis and Robert H. Taylor, Republicans. 
Coke received 103,038 votes to Davis’s 51,220, and the entire Demo¬ 
cratic ticket was elected. As soon as the result was known, Governor 
Davis declared he would not surrender the office until April 26, that 
being the date when the Twelfth Legislature met in regular session 
in 1870; when, by law, his term expired in January. Finding that 


THE RECONSTRUCTION PERIOD, 1865-1874 513 


this contention would probably fail him, a method was then adopted 
to set the entire election aside as illegal, because it had not been held 
on four days, as provided in the Constitution. To raise this question, 
a Mexican named Rodriguez was arrested for illegal voting, and he 
pleaded in defence that the election at which he voted was not a legal 
and valid election. In order to settle the point, it was necessary to 
construe a sentence in the Constitution in which a semicolon was used, 
and a change in the punctuation might change the meaning. The case 
came before the Supreme Court, composed then of Judges J. D. 
McAdoo, Moses B. Walker, and Wesley Ogden, and the court held 
the election to be illegal and void, basing the decision on the force of 
the semicolon. Upon such slender threads do the destinies of nations 
sometimes hang! That court has always since been called the “Semi¬ 
colon Court,” and to this day none of its decisions are ever cited as 
good law in the courts of Texas. 

But the Democrats were not to be cheated of their victory by 
judicial quibbles over punctuation, nor by the arbitrary claims of 
Governor Davis. They prepared to assume control of the government 
to which they had been elected by the people, peaceably, if possible; 
forcibly, if necessary. Governor Davis appealed to President Grant 
for military aid, the capitol was occupied and surrounded by armed 
men, and a bloody revolution seemed inevitable. But, fortunately, 
the Federal authorities declined to interfere; Davis sullenly yielded, 
Coke was inaugurated, Reconstruction had ended, and on January 
17 , 1874 , Texas was once more a free State in the American Union. 


CHAPTER XL 


THE GRANGE AS A POLITICAL FACTOR IN TEXAS 

By Roscoe C. Martin 

[This paper is from The Southwestern Political and Social Science Quar¬ 
terly, VI, No. 4 (March, 1926). It and the same author’s article on the Greenback 
party in Texas ( Southwestern Historical Quarterly XXX, 161-177) give some 
account of “third parties” in Texas politics. See also: Winkler, Platforms of 
Political Parties in Texas (University of Texas Bulletin, 1916). Read: Barker, 
Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 243-266.] 

In introducing a study, however brief, of the local activities of 
the farmers’ organization known as the Grange, it is necessary to 
call attention briefly to certain of the larger phases of the movement. 
It must be understood, first, that the Grange was not a localized organ¬ 
ization, but that it was the local reflection of a movement nation-wide 
in its scope and importance; and, second, that the Grange as such 
was not an isolated incident, but that it was properly considered one 
phase of a great “Agrarian Crusade” which swept the country dur¬ 
ing the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Hence, although this 
paper is dedicated to the task of examining the influence of the 
Grange as a political factor in Texas, it will be profitable to digress 
somewhat and to note briefly something of the nature of the farmers’ 
crusade in its entirety. 1 

The agrarian unrest existent throughout the United States during 
the last quarter of the nineteenth century was due immediately to 
certain well-defined causes and factors which combined to react in a 
way unfavorable to agriculture and agriculturists the country over. 
The farmers were confronted with very real and practical problems, 
upon the solution of which depended to a considerable extent the 
prosperity of the agricultural classes. Certain other classes were 
concerned in working out the same problems; but none of these were 
as vitally interested as the farmers, whose very existence was bound 
up inextricably with the remedying of ills and the ameliorating of 
conditions known to workingmen in general and to the farmers in 
particular. These conditions were largely economic in nature, al- 

1 Solon J. Buck gives what is probably the clearest, most succinct survey of 
the movement for organization and cooperation among the farmers in his book 
entitled The Agrarian Crusade (Yale University Press, New Haven, 1920). 

514 


THE GRANGE AS A POLITICAL FACTOR IN TEXAS 515 


though in certain sections the farmers were disgruntled with the polit¬ 
ical situation. The railroads, for example, brought with them certain 
problems, in the solution of which the agricultural classes were vitally 
interested. The discontent everywhere evident is proof sufficient that 
the farmers were far from satisfied with the situation brought about 
by the railroads and their relations with the various state govern¬ 
ments. Again, while the prices of agricultural supplies and necessi¬ 
ties advanced steadily, those of farm produce remained stationary, 
or, in some cases, even declined. This constituted a ground of com¬ 
plaint which was capitalized to the fullest extent by the farmer’s organ¬ 
izations. Thirdly, there was the whole question of the currency. The 
farmers naturally enough wanted more instead of less money, and 
they directed their energies toward carrying their point here. There 
were other “sore spots” which contributed to the discontent of the 
agricultural classes: the tariff demanded an adjustment, from the 
point of view of the farmer especially; the question of reconstruction 
was a grave one; and, in the South, at least, the negro problem was 
one which weighed heavily upon the shoulders of the farmer. All 
these problems contributed their bit to the ever-growing tide of dis¬ 
content among the agriculturists, a tide which issued finally in a great 
movement for organization and cooperation known as the Agrarian 
Crusade. 

The Agrarian Crusade was ushered in with the organization of 
the Grange, an order which was professedly non-political in character, 
but which nevertheless managed to call the attention of both state 
and national governments to its demands in such a way that they were 
not to be denied. Following the Grange and accepting its financial 
teachings in good part was the Greenback Party, which championed 
the cause of the agricultural classes in political campaigns until the 
early eighties, when the movement began definitely to subside. Both 
of these organizations gained concessions for the farmers, but even 
as the Greenback cause declined it became evident that the reforms 
brought about by the early agrarian agitators had not been as thorough¬ 
going as the farmers desired. With the realization of this fact went 
the conviction that further reforms and concessions should be de¬ 
manded; hence a new representative of the agricultural classes was 
not long in taking shape. The Farmers’ Alliance assumed form slowly 
during the early eighties, and by the latter part of the decade was 
able to step into the breach left by the demise of the Greenback Party. 
The Alliance, like the Grange fifteen years previous, was professedly 
a non-political organization; but, also like the Grange, it was pos¬ 
sessed of a tremendous strength as a political factor. Nevertheless, 
its leaders refused to participate in political campaigns in the name 
of the order, and the People’s Party was organized in 1890-92 with 
the principles of the Alliance incorporated in its platform. The 
earlier organization gave way to Populism, and the agricultural classes 


516 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


united in national politics in support of Populist candidates, many of 
whom were elected. The party came to an untimely end when, in 
1896, the Democratic Party incorporated the Populist platform into 
its own, accepting almost in their entirety the principles announced 
by the People’s Party. The capture of the Democratic Party may be 
looked upon as the ultimate political triumph of the Agrarian Crusade, 
since by that fact the farmers were guaranteed actual consideration 
for their demands. 

The passing of Populism brought to an end the crusade of the 
farmers, a movement which had been in progress for a quarter of a 
century. Various other organizations have come into existence since 
1900, but there has been no definite, clear-cut movement such as 
that which swept the country during the latter part of the nineteenth 
century. 2 The twenty-five years from 1875 to 1900 are unique in 
American politics, for they witnessed a phenomenon which is without 
parallel in the history of the country. Four great movements arose 
in turn in protest against the economic (and in some cases the politi¬ 
cal) system under which the agricultural classes labored—namely, 
the Grange, the Greenback party, the Farmers* Alliance, and the 
People’s party. The four were essentially related. Although each 
differed from the others in organization, and, to some extent, at least, 
in statement of principles and policies, all had the same ultimate end, 
to gain privileges and concessions for the farmers whenever and 
wherever possible. Thus the four are considered as but parts of 
the great movement evident of the general feeling of agricultural dis¬ 
content throughout the period and known popularly as the Agrarian 
Crusade. 

From these considerations it is fairly evident that no one of the 
four movements which constitute the Agrarian Crusade may be studied 
properly as complete in and of itself. Nevertheless, if it be kept in 
mind that the four are inseparably related, it may prove profitable to 
give individual attention to each. The Grange in particular lends 
itself to separate examination. In the first place, it was the move¬ 
ment which introduced the Agrarian Crusade, and therefore merits 
special consideration. In the second place, while it cannot be sepa¬ 
rated from its successor, the line of demarcation between the two is 
sufficiently plain to permit such consideration without a great deal 
of loss or inconvenience. In the third place, the accomplishments of 
the Grange and the results of Grange organization, while not always 
clearly evident, are reasonably definite in character, and thus may be 
noted with a fair degree of accuracy. It would seem, therefore, that 
we may discuss the political consequences of the Granger movement 

2 An exception must be noted in the case of the Farm Bureau movement, 
which has gained great momentum during the last decade. The Farm Bureau 
undoubtedly wields a great power in politics, although it is not possible at this 
time to measure accurately the importance of its activities. 


THE GRANGE AS A POLITICAL FACTOR IN TEXAS 517 


in Texas with a reasonable assurance that the results to be considered 
are those, directly or indirectly, of the activities of the Grange in the 
state. 

The order known as the Patrons of Husbandry, or, more familiarly, 
the Grange, was founded in 1867, the national organization preceding 
the local. Its founder, O. H. Kelley, a clerk in the Agricultural 
Bureau at Washington, conceived the idea while traveling through 
the South on an official mission in 1866. Kelley was struck by the 
apathy of the farmers generally, and by the universal economic depres¬ 
sion among the agricultural classes; and he returned to Washington 
determined to devise some scheme which would assist the farmer in 
meeting the new and strange problems which confronted him. His 
idea took form in 1867 with the founding of the Grange, his asso¬ 
ciates in the venture being some half-a-dozen government clerks. A 
well-directed publicity campaign coupled with Kelley’s perseverance 
served to tide the organization over the initial lean period, and within 
three or four years the Grange was known throughout the length and 
breadth of the agricultural section. 

The Grange reached Texas in 1873 with the establishment of a 
subordinate grange at Salado, in Bell County. Thenceforward, the 
movement gained momentum rapidly throughout the state, so that 
by April, 1874, three hundred and sixty granges had been founded. 
In the meantime, the Texas State Grange had been organized, although 
its organization was not perfected until a meeting of April 14, 1874. 
The State Grange grew and prospered, until, at the peak of the move¬ 
ment in 1876 and 1877, it boasted a membership of 45,000, of 
whom 6,000 were women. A period of decline set in immediately 
thereafter, and the State Grange lost heavily and steadily in mem¬ 
bership. At no subsequent date did it approach the 40,000 mark; and, 
although it was granted a brief respite in the early eighties, the reawak¬ 
ening of interest was only temporary. As an organization of state¬ 
wide interest and importance, the order was of little influence after 
1880, and after 1885 it was rarely referred to, even in a casual way, 
by contemporary writers. 

The purposes of the Grange, as stated by its officers, may be 
summed up under three heads. In the first place, the home life of 
the members was to be given a new meaning by the activities of the 
order. In the second place, social intercourse was to be fostered and 
encouraged, with the idea that such association would be of mutual 
benefit. In the third place, the members of the Grange were to gain 
certain advantages through new methods of dealing with the business 
world. Among the chief of these new weapons was agricultural coop¬ 
eration, which was enthusiastically adopted by the farmers. It will 
be noted that the objects as stated above do not include participation, 
either direct or indirect, in politics. In fact, the leaders of the order 
were at some pains to explain that the Grange must not be dragged 


518 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


into politics; and a penalty was set upon any subordinate grange which 
might attempt to capitalize the name of the Grange as a political 
instrument. Members were permitted, nay, encouraged, to take an 
active part in politics, but it was in their capacity as citizens that they 
were to do this, and not as Grangers. 3 

It was on this very point that the Grange and its critics disagreed, 
officers of the order urging Grangers throughout the state to engage 
actively in politics, even to the extent of announcing for office if this 
became necessary to secure the interests of the farmers. In recom¬ 
mending such action as a final recourse, they distinguished between 
the Granger as a private citizen, who might in this capacity participate 
in political campaigns, and the Granger as such, who was pledged to 
keep the order free from the partisan smirch. The critics of the 
Grange, on the other hand, made no such distinction. It was impos¬ 
sible for them to see how a member of the Grange might run for 
office without using, to some extent at least, his influence as a Granger. 
Hence, when the farmer leaders advanced the idea, as they did time 
and again, that the agricultural classes should be represented in the 
legislative branches of the government, the opponents of the Grange 
seized the opportunity to raise the cry that the order was marshaling 
its forces as a political party. The aid of the press was enlisted in 
these efforts to discredit the Grange, and newspapers throughout the 
state were almost fanatical in their denunciation of secret political 
intrigue—usually without waiting to ascertain the truth of the rumors 
on which their accusations were based. It must be added that occa¬ 
sionally these attacks found some justification in fact, although it is 
certain that more often nothing came of the rumored political activities 
of the Grange. 

A great majority of the charges brought by those who feared the 
Grange were directed against William W. Lang, Worthy Master of 
the Texas State Grange. Lang was a college graduate and a suc¬ 
cessful farmer, and was very popular personally over the state; but 
his position as head of the Grange made him especially liable to attack 
by its enemies. He was looked upon as the logical candidate of the 
order for political office; the politicians of the established party saw 
in him the leader of a potentially powerful rival party, and they 
questioned his every action. Indeed, the Worthy Master found it 
impossible to avoid politics altogether. As early as 1874 and 1875 
he was mentioned as a possible candidate for governor, and was 
forced publicly to disclaim any desire to stand for election for that 
office. Again, in 1875, a movement was inaugurated to name the 
Worthy Master candidate for Congress from the Fourth District, and 
again the boom collapsed with his refusal to allow himself to be nomi¬ 
nated. In the spring elections of 1876, Lang was brought forward 

3 No political test was applied to candidates for membership in the Grange. 
On the contrary, men of any and all parties were welcomed, and their activities 
as Grangers in no way interfered with their political allegiance. 


THE GRANGE AS A POLITICAL FACTOR IN TEXAS 519 

as a candidate for a place in the state legislature, and in this instance 
he allowed his friends to nominate him. He was elected, serving thus 
in the first legislature to meet under the new Constitution. A storm 
of protest arose at once, and the Worthy Master was denounced on 
every hand for having dragged the Grange into politics in spite of 
the numerous protests against his candidacy. 4 

From 1876 to 1878 Lang’s possibilities as a gubernatorial candi¬ 
date were discussed in full by the newspapers of the state, the dis¬ 
cussion serving to keep the name of the Grange leader in the public 
mind. By 1878, the voters throughout the state had become accus¬ 
tomed to think of the Worthy Master as a possible candidate, and 
were not unprepared when, in May, 1878, the Examiner suggested 
him as the best man available for the office. In answer to inquiry 
from the press, Lang declared that he was a Democrat in politics, and 
that he would be governed by the action of the Democratic State 
Convention. The Convention, which met at Austin in July, 1878, 
failed to view his candidacy in a favorable light; and, true to his 
promise, the Grange leader refused to make the race as an Independ¬ 
ent. After this time, agitation both for and against the candidacy 
of the Worthy Master subsided, and the Grange was left to pursue 
its course in comparative peace. 

Such, in brief, is an outline of the activities of the Grange in 
Texas in so far as actual participation in politics is concerned, and 
in so far as such participation can be measured accurately. The 
leaders of the order were apparently sincere in their desire to main¬ 
tain its nonpartisan character, but in this they were only partly suc¬ 
cessful. . . . 

Although the Grange took part, through its leaders, in the politics 
of the state during the latter seventies, it was not in actual participa¬ 
tion in politics that the order manifested its greatest strength. Had 
the Grange contented itself with the campaign of its leader in 1878, 
it would indeed have exercised some influence politically; but the 
order is remembered today, not for Lang’s term in the state legisla¬ 
ture or for his unsuccessful campaign for the Democratic nomination 
for Governor, but for what it accomplished in a practical way. The 
accomplishments of the Grange are measured in good part by legisla¬ 
tive enactment, brought about through its influence upon the legis¬ 
lature of the state. 

The legislature was constantly reminded of the desires and needs 

4 It is altogether probable that other Grangers were elected to serve in the 
state legislature during this period; but, inasmuch as legislators were reported as 
Democrats, Republicans, and Independents, and not as representatives of the 
Grange, it is impossible to determine whether or not this was the case. It is inter¬ 
esting to note, however, that the legislature during the time when the Grange was 
thriving contained a distinct agrarian element. Indeed, one-half of the legis¬ 
lators were farmers ordinarily, and sometimes an even greater per cent were 
engaged in agricultural pursuits; and it is no more than reasonable to suppose 
that a considerable number of these farmer legislators were also Grangers. 


520 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


of the farmers in various ways. At almost every session of the State 
Grange a committee on memorials was appointed, whose sole duty 
it was to prepare a list of grievances of the agricultural classes and 
to suggest ways and means of redressing those grievances. The list 
was referred first to the Grange convention; after it had been ex¬ 
amined and approved by that body it was presented to the legislature 
in the form of a memorial. Such memorials, together with additional 
resolutions and petitions, were voted on regularly and sent to the 
legislature, and some even were addressed directly to Congress. Again, 
committees were appointed on occasion to present the case of the 
farmers before the legislature, and officers of the Grange were com¬ 
missioned to appear before various legislative committees as attorneys 
for the order. These proceedings were placed before the people by 
Grange lecturers, and through the speeches of the officers of the order, 
which were reproduced in the annual Proceedings and in the official 
organ of the Grange, the Daily Examiner. 

Newspaper discussions and debates also assisted in educating the 
public to the Grange program, even though many of these discussions 
were based on false or inaccurate reports and ideas. In these ways 
a tremendous influence was brought to bear upon the legislature. That 
body had a great respect for the Grange, and justly so, for it is not 
improbable that the order numbered among its members and friends 
at least half of the voting population of the state. Texas was, during 
the last quarter of the last century, preponderantly agricultural in 
its interests; and the agricultural classes, whether avowedly Granger 
or not, were influenced by the same factors, factors making for seem¬ 
ing inequality and oppression of those classes. Hence, when the 
farmers spoke, as they frequently did, through the Grange and its 
agents, their demands and suggestions were at least given respectful 
attention, and usually some positive action was taken by way of 
alleviating the conditions complained of. 

During the seventies, the memorials of the Grange to the Legis¬ 
lature most often took the form of complaints against the railroads. 
Discrimination in the form of rebates, passes, varying rate schedules 
for long and short hauls, and exorbitant freight rates formed the 
bases for these complaints; and the farmers proposed to have their 
ills and those of the railroads examined into by the Legislature. As 
early as 1874 warnings of the conflict were sounded by the leaders 
of the Grange, and in 1875 the situation was discussed openly and 
plainly. The annual address of the Worthy Master for that year 
gives the farmers' side of the question in no uncertain terms. Atten¬ 
tion was called to the ‘Tearful rate of freights” charged by the rail¬ 
roads; and the regulation of monopolies by law was declared to be 
a necessity, railroads, of course, being classed as monopolies. Of 
special significance is the following statement: Railroads are by their 
very nature monopolies, and have a power over the public to make 


THE GRANGE AS A POLITICAL FACTOR IN TEXAS 521 

unjust demands unless restrained by legislative control. The master 
allowed the claim that the railroads were “vested rights,” but con¬ 
tinued that “when vested rights become public tyrannies, it is high 
time for them to be regulated, not destroyed, by the necessary laws 
and constitutional enactments of a free people.” Lang, and the 
Grange as a whole, for that matter, far from condemning the railroads, 
recognized their value to the farmer, and gave them full credit for 
unlimited possibilities in developing the state. What the Worthy 
Master and the Grange did want, however, was regulation of the rail¬ 
roads in such a way as to provide for fair schedules of fares and 
freights, and the prevention of discrimination and unjust tactics by 
the railroads and their officials. 

Agitation for governmental regulation of the railroads was so 
pronounced that the Constitutional Convention of 1875 was forced 
to take cognizance of the situation. This it did in Article X of the 
Constitution, which deals exclusively with the railroads. Section 2 
of the article provides that the legislature shall pass laws to correct 
abuses and to prevent discrimination and extortion in the schedule 
of the railroads. Section 5 forbids the consolidation of parallel or 
competing lines. The remaining seven sections of the article either 
make specific provisions for laws to control the railroads, or include 
enabling clauses by which the legislature may pass acts deemed just 
and proper to the accomplishment of that end. 

The Fifteenth Legislature, which convened in April, 1876, after 
the Constitution had been adopted the preceding February, made no 
attempt to carry through any of the acts which that instrument em¬ 
powered it to pass. The agitation concerning the railroads, which 
had died away to an extent with the incorporation of the railroad 
clauses into the Constitution, became more pronounced than ever. 
Colonel Jones, Master of the Waco District Grange, complained of 
the discrimination in freight rates that was still evident despite the 
constitutional provision that the legislature should pass laws to regu¬ 
late these rates. 5 Worthy Master Lang continued his campaign 
against the unjust practices of the railroads, making speeches over 
the country in his efforts to obtain favorable legislation for the farmers. 
In a speech delivered in June, 1878, he said that the railroads were 
about to obtain complete control over the state; that they were influ¬ 
encing unduly the officers of the state; and that, unless something 
were done to remedy the existing evils, the Grange would be forced 
to take a hand in the matter. 

As a result of the protests voiced and the dissatisfaction every¬ 
where evident, the Sixteenth Legislature, which convened in Janu¬ 
ary, 1879, passed a law making 50 cents per hundred pounds the 

5 Colonel Jones made the point that the rate on a bale of cotton from Waco 
to Galveston was $4.50, while from Dallas to Galveston, a much greater dis¬ 
tance, it was only $2 .—Waco Daily Examiner, May 15, 1878. 


522 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


maximum charge for the transportation of freight. The act also 
prohibited unjust discrimination against persons or towns, and de¬ 
clared that a higher charge to one person than to another for the 
same services rendered would be taken as prima facie evidence of 
discrimination. The act professed to eliminate discrimination and 
exorbitant freight rates, but in its results it was far from satisfactory. 
In 1882, A. J. Rose, who had succeeded Lang as Worthy Master 
of the Grange, paid his respects to the tactics of the railroads in his 
addresses, and the Grangers throughout the state supported him in 
his fight for strict regulation by the government, just as they had 
supported their former chief. In his annual address for 1882, he 
demanded the passage of legislation dealing with the problem, and 
stated that, although seven years had passed since the adoption of the 
Constitution, no law regulating freight rates had been passed. In 
this he quite ignored the act of 1879, which certainly had for its aim 
the regulation of rates, whether it accomplished its purpose or not. 
The president of the Texas Cooperative Association took up the cry, 
and reported numerous instances of discrimination and exorbitant 
rates. Many other complaints and protests were heard from every 
part of the state, from the public generally as well as from the agri¬ 
cultural classes. 

The effect of these protests is seen in a series of acts passed be¬ 
tween 1882 and 1892. Two acts dealing with the railroads were 
passed by the Seventeenth Legislature in 1882. The first of these 
purposed to regulate passenger fare, providing a maximum rate of 
3 cents per mile. The second prohibited the railroads from making 
a greater charge for freight than that specified in the bill of lading. 
Both of these acts neglected to inquire into the cause of the evils, 
and it remained for the Eighteenth Legislature to pass, in 1883, an 
act elaborating on the principles of the law of 1879. The law of 
1883 was still unsatisfactory, and it came to be generally recognized 
that such a body as the legislature was not qualified to deal with the 
problems of railway regulation. The creation of the Railroad Com¬ 
mission at last met the difficulty in a fairly satisfactory way, and it 
was not until the Commission had been established that the public 
ceased to protest. As early as 1876, the Grange suggested that some 
such body should be created to deal with the problem, and from time 
to time the suggestion was repeated. Several attempts were made 
to pass a bill establishing a commission, but the railroad lobby proved 
strong enough to delay favorable action on the question until 1891, 
when the Railroad Commission Act was passed. 

The act of 1891 wrote the final chapter in the history of legisla¬ 
tive regulation of railroads in the state. From the very day of its 
introduction into Texas, the Grange took an active part in insisting 
upon the correction of abuses practiced by the railroads. Memorials, 
petitions, and resolutions were presented constantly to the legislature, 


THE GRANGE AS A POLITICAL FACTOR IN TEXAS 523 


and the addresses of the leaders of the Grange made that body appre¬ 
ciate more fully the consequences that might attend a denial of 
the requests of the order. Hence it is not too much to say that the 
Grange was very influential in carrying through the earlier laws deal¬ 
ing with the railroad problems, and that it was, both because of its 
early agitation and because of its active support of reform, one of 
the most powerful factors in the passage of the law providing for 
the creation of the Railroad Commission. 

Hand in hand with the Granger agitation against discriminatory 
practices by the railroads went protests against the operations of 
trusts and monopolies in general. Influential Grange leaders recog¬ 
nized from the first the fact that trusts and monoplies played a very 
important part in determining the economic condition of the farmer, 
and within a year after the introduction of the Grange into Texas 
they were demanding government regulation of trusts. Attention 
has been called to Worthy Master Lang’s attitude on monopolies. 
Grange officials throughout the state were wholehearted in their 
support of the stand taken by the Worthy Master. Frequent denun¬ 
ciation were hurled at the great business enterprises which, it was 
charged, threatened by their operations to ruin the agricultural classes. 
Specifically, the Grange took exception to the activities of the Jute 
Bagging Trust, and numerous accusations against the Trust were 
made in the annual Grange conventions. Again, the Galveston Wharf 
Company was accused of overcharging the farmers for handling and 
storing cotton, and statistics were introduced by the Waco Examiner 
to show that wharfage duties at Galveston were three times those 
charged at Boston. Other charges were made, and the Examiner 
was especially zealous in demanding regulation of the Wharf Com¬ 
pany by the legislature. 

The operations of various other big business enterprises were noted 
with disapproval by the Grange leaders, who employed their best 
weapons to bring about government regulation of trusts and monopo¬ 
lies. Throughout the later seventies and the whole of the eighties 
the legislature was addressed time and again, until at last it became 
necessary for that body to take positive action. This it did in 1889, 
passing in that year an act defining trusts, forbidding their existence 
or operation in Texas, and providing for punishment and penalties 
for violation of the law. Here again, although the act passed in 
answer to the demands of the Grange became effective only after 
that order had become impotent in the state, the influence of Grange 
activities in behalf of trust regulation is not to be denied. 

Next to the questionable practices of the railroads and the opera¬ 
tions of trusts and monopolies, the Grange protested most bitterly 
against taxation, and their protests usually took the form of an 
impeachment of the farm produce tax. The State Comptroller, acting 
under the advice of the Attorney General, construed the tax law of 


524 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


1876 to include for assessment agricultural products, and a tax was 
accordingly laid upon all farm produce. Vigorous protests were at 
once heard from the Grange, and the cry was soon taken up by every 
farmer in the State. Lang, in his annual address of 1878, attacked 
the tax as being unwise and unsound, and advised the Grange that 
steps should be taken at once to look into the matter. A committee 
on the produce tax was appointed, and after investigating the situa¬ 
tion, it reported that the Constitution did not warrant the levying 
of a tax on agricultural produce, nor did the legislature intend that 
an interpretation providing for such a tax should be read into their 
act of 1876. It was generally agreed that the Comptroller had acted 
without constitutional authority, and the executive committee was 
authorized to memorialize the legislature to relieve the farmers of 
the onerous exactions of the produce tax. A similar resolution was 
adopted in 1879, and the Worthy Master was ordered to present a 
second memorial to the legislature and to argue the case of the farmers 
before the various committees to which the question might be referred. 
So well respected were these memorials that the Sixteenth Legislature, 
which convened in 1879, passed a joint resolution stating specifically 
that farm produce was exempt from all taxation. In this way were 
the demands of the Grange regarding the “smokehouse and corncrib ,, 
tax answered. 

A fourth evil which the Grange called to the attention of the 
legislature was the usurious rates of interest charged by the money¬ 
lenders. Money of any kind, and especially specie, was scarce in 
Texas, as in other southern states, for several years after the war. 
As a consequence, a man who had money to lend could command 
almost any rate of interest he cared to ask, and cases were reported 
where the note on a loan called for from 3 to 6 per cent per month. 
The legitimate money-lender, and the legitimate borrower as well, 
were undone by these wildcat practices, and demands were made 
on every hand for governmental regulation of interest rates. The 
Examiner was especially zealous in presenting the cause of the 
farmers, but its editor was not alone in speaking for the Grange. 
Resolution after resolution was drawn up and presented to the legis¬ 
lature by subordinate granges and by individual members of the order. 
The result is seen in Article XVI, Section 11 of the Constitution, 
which set a maximum of twelve per cent per annum on the rate of 
interest, with a legal rate of eight per cent. The Fifteenth Legislature 
carried out the mandate of the Constitution by passing an act provid¬ 
ing for the punishment of usury, usury being defined as a rate of 
interest higher than that specified by the Constitution. The safeguards 
mentioned were fairly satisfactory for a time, but after a few years 
complaints became audible again. The response to the new evidences 
of dissatisfaction was a constitutional amendment, proposed by the 


THE GRANGE AS A POLITICAL FACTOR IN TEXAS 525 


Twenty-second Legislature and adopted, reducing the maximum rate 
of interest to ten and the legal rate to six per cent. 

It is not necessary to speak at any length here of the transporta¬ 
tion facilities, or rather the lack of transportation facilities, in the 
state during the seventies and eighties. A primary problem of the 
farmer was the marketing of his produce, and the difficulty of market¬ 
ing was measured largely by the difficulty or ease with which farm 
produce might be transported to market. Hence the farmer was 
intensely interested in every project to increase the facilities for 
transportation, and his representative, the Grange, did everything in 
its power to accomplish that end. The railroads have been mentioned 
in sufficient detail elsewhere; here it might be recalled simply that 
a fairly efficient system of railway transportation was in operation 
in the state by 1880. A problem second only to the railroads was 
that of providing an outlet by water for farm produce. Such an 
outlet, it was believed, would increase materially the value of Texas 
crops, inasmuch as it would furnish the farmer with a means of 
dealing directly with the eastern and foreign markets, and would in 
addition furnish competition with the railroads. The Grange then 
supported every move to secure to Texas a deep water harbor on 
the Gulf, and was itself the originator of several such moves. Worthy 
Master Lang, in his annual address of 1878, pointed out the advan¬ 
tages to be gained from a harbor that might receive deep sea vessels, 
and recommended that the Grange memorialize the Senate of the 
United States to grant to Texas the benefits of a foreign and eastern 
trade. The memorial was duly prepared and presented to the Senate, 
and the Grange continued to prepare petitions and to assist in getting 
out propaganda in favor of a deep water harbor. The Seventeenth 
Legislature, taking a leaf from the history of developments in the 
state, passed a joint resolution setting forth substantially the points 
made previously by the Grange, and instructing the stated representa¬ 
tives and senators to urge in Congress the passage of a bill giving 
to Texas a deep water harbor at the port of Galveston. The resolu¬ 
tion also provided that the governors of other states interested in a 
water outlet through Texas should be notified of the action taken 
and requested to support the project. The Eighteenth Legislature 
also passed resolutions, one pertaining to Sabine Pass, and another 
to Galveston, requesting the representatives and senators of the state 
to use their influence to secure deep water at those places. The 
Nineteenth Legislature followed the example of its predecessors, and 
passed resolutions pertaining to a deep water harbor. All this while 
the Grange was passing resolutions regularly, and these resolutions 
could not have been without their effect on the legislature. 

In addition to these few primary problems, there were a number 
of issues on which the Grange took a very decided stand, and thereby 


526 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


gave a political tone to the declarations of principles of the order. 
The first of these, the tariff question, called forth some remarkable 
denunciations from the Grange. At every meeting of the order the 
tariff was brought up for discussion, and many memorials were ad¬ 
dressed to Congress calling for an adjustment of the tariff schedules. 
Another question which interested the Grange was that of immigra¬ 
tion. A committee on immigration was appointed from year to year, 
and active steps were taken to induce farmers from other states and 
from foreign countries as well to settle in Texas, either as independent 
farmers or as farm laborers. Immigration societies and companies 
were formed; Worthy Master Lang resigned as head of the Grange 
to become President of one of these, the South Western Immigration 
Company. The immigration question and the active support of 
practically unlimited immigration by the Grange had, of course, its 
influence in a political way, inasmuch as the state legislature was 
interested in the same question. The policy of the Grange with regard 
to manufactures in Texas was another phase of the order’s activities 
which often led it into dealings with the legislature. The committee 
on memorials worked overtime in preparing petitions requesting legis¬ 
lative support of local manufacturing enterprises; and, although the 
lawmakers were in favor of the development of local manufactures, 
they seem never to have seen the need for active interference in this 
field. The financial problems likewise called forth some very decided 
opinions from the Grange; and the Greenback Party later gave these 
opinions due publicity in its campaigns, both state and national. 

In these various fields of action did the Grange make its influence 
felt in a political way. The order called for Government regulation 
of railroads and other trusts and monopolies, and such regulation 
was forthcoming; it protested against the produce tax, and the tax 
was removed; it demanded a law against usury, and a maximum 
rate-of-interest law was passed; it favored a deep water harbor for 
Texas, and such a harbor was eventually provided for; it objected to 
a protective tariff, and memorial after memorial was addressed to 
Congress in behalf of a tariff for revenue only; and it took such a 
stand for immigration and for home manufactures that the legislature 
was given little opportunity to overlook these questions. The influ¬ 
ence of the Grange may not, of course, always be measured directly, 
for other factors must be taken into consideration. It is a significant 
fact, however, that almost every question raised by the order was 
settled in a way favorable to the farmer. Memorials, petitions, reso¬ 
lutions, addressess, and speeches, votes of approval of favorable and 
of disapproval of unfavorable acts—all these were listened to with 
great respect by the public at large, and it was indeed a strong legisla¬ 
ture that was not influenced to a considerable extent by these manifes¬ 
tations from the farmers’ “party.” 


CHAPTER XLI 


A BRIEF SURVEY OF THE ECONOMIC HISTORY 
OF TEXAS, 1865-1915 

By Edmund Thornton Miller 

[The selections which follow are made up of the brief summaries with 
which Professor Miller, in his Financial History of Texas, introduces the sev¬ 
eral periods of the state’s financial history from 1865 to 1915. Each summary 
is followed in his book by a detailed discussion of the financial history of the 
respective period. Professor Miller’s book was published by the University of 
Texas in 1916. These selections are from pages 156-159, 195; 196-198; 240- 
243; 385-390. Read: Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 
224-248.] 


I. The Reconstruction Period, 1865-1874 

Although General Lee surrendered early in April, 1865, the break¬ 
up of the Confederacy did not occur in Texas until the end of May. Dis¬ 
organization of all authority followed, and in the general confusion 
Confederate and state property was appropriated by disbanded soldiers 
and even the state treasury at Austin was looted. The loss of prop¬ 
erty, however, was small and the disorder little when viewed against 
the background of bitter disappointment and uncertainty of the future 
which the people of the state felt on account of the downfall of the 
Confederacy. 

The arrival at Galveston on June 19, 1865, of General Gordon 
Granger initiated the first provisional government—a mongrel of civil 
and military rule, but predominantly military. A. J. Hamilton, who 
had been appointed on June 17 provisional governor of Texas by 
President Johnson, arrived at Galveston on July 21, and proceeded 
soon to Austin to take office. After some delay a registration of 
those citizens of the state who would take the oath of amnesty was 
made and an election of delegates to a constitutional convention was 
ordered. The convention met in Austin on February 7, 1866, and 
was in session eight weeks. In the election that followed the con¬ 
servative ticket, or that endorsing President Johnson’s policy for the 
restoration of the state governments, headed by J. W. Throckmorton 
was successful, and the amendments to the constitution were adopted. 
The newly elected government took possession on August 13, 1866, 

527 


528 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


and on August 20 President Johnson declared by proclamation that 
the insurrection in Texas was at an end. The restoration of civil 
government to a normal state and the amelioration of general condi¬ 
tions were terminated, however, by the reversal by Congress of Presi¬ 
dent Johnson’s policy. Under the provisions of the so-called Recon¬ 
struction Acts, passed in March and July of 1867, Texas became a 
part of the Fifth Military District, and went again under a provisional 
form of government which lasted from August 8, 1867, to January, 
1870. Again, also, the process of emergence from the provisional 
form of government was gone through with, and another constitution 
was adopted and another election of state officials was held. E. J. 
Davis was the new governor elected, and his administration, which is 
popularly known as the period of radical rule, lasted three full years. 
It was undermined by the election of a democratic legislature—the 
famous Thirteenth—in November, 1872, and fell and was swept away 
by the election in December, 1873, and the inauguration on January 
15, 1874, of Richard Coke as governor. 

During the years of the Civil War and the Reconstruction, and 
especially during the decade 1860-1870, the absolute growth in pop¬ 
ulation and material wealth was the smallest of any decade in the 
history of the state. Population increased from 604,215 in i860 to 
818,579 in 1870. This was a percentage increase of 35.5 as compared 
with 184.2 during the decade 1850-1860. The United States Census 
of i860 placed the number of slaves at 182,566 or 30.2 per cent of 
the total population. This vast mass of propertyless, ignorant blacks 
was added to the citizenship of the state as a result of the war, and 
by 1870 the negro element of the population numbered 253,475, or 
30.9 per cent of the total population. Nothing was done up to 1870 
to improve the economic or intellectual status of this class, and noth¬ 
ing could be done for either whites or negroes because of the mis- 
government at Washington and the prostrate financial condition of 
the state. 

The amount of illiteracy and the conditions as to education pointed 
to the greatest task of the state,—namely, the education of its citizens. 
Thirty-three per cent of the population ten years of age and over 
could not read, and there were only 548 schools in 1870, with 23,076 
pupils, 706 teachers, and a total income of $414,800. 

The population of the state was almost wholly employed in agri¬ 
culture, and this added to the difficulties of the problem of education. 
Out of the total of the population ten years and over engaged in all 
occupations 166,753, or 70 per cent, were engaged in agriculture. 
The population of the state was thinly spread out, the average density 
being 3.1 persons to the square mile. 

Agriculture showed a marked decline during the decade 1860- 
1870. Evidences of this decline were the decrease in the value of 


ECONOMIC HISTORY OF TEXAS 


529 


the farms from $88,101,320 to $60,149,950, or 45.4 per cent, the 
decrease in the value of farming implements from $6,259,452 to $3,- 
396,793, or 56.6 per cent, and a change in the acreage of land in farms 
from 25,343,028 in i860 to 18,396,523 in 1870, or 27.4 per cent. The 
ratio of farm acreage to the total area of the state declined from 
15.1 in i860 to 11.0 in 1870. The per cent of land in farms which 
was improved increased, however, from 10.4 to 16.1. The produc¬ 
tion of cotton was 431,463 bales in 1859 and 350,628 in 1869. The 
price of cotton fluctuated violently during the period. In 1865 the 
price was 43.2 cents per pound and in 1870 it was 17 cents. 

Manufacturing, railroad construction, and banking increased dur¬ 
ing the period. The railroad mileage grew from 307 in i860 to 711 
in 1870, or 131 per cent. Manufacturing establishments numbered 
983 in i860 with a value of products of $6,577,202, and in 1870 they 
numbered 2,399 products valued at $11,517,302. As to banking, 
there was only one chartered bank in Texas in i860. It was located 
in Galveston and had a capital of about $100,000. Four national banks 
were established in 1866, and this number remained unchanged until 
1870. Two of the national banks were located in Galveston, one was 
in Houston and one was in San Antonio. Their capital and surplus 
amounted to $575,000; their deposits to $617,000, and their loans to 
$532,000. The Constitution of 1869 abandoned the policy of pro¬ 
hibiting state banks which had been followed since 1846, and a number 
of such banks were organized. For the state as a whole the supply 
of credit facilities during this period was in the hands of merchants 
and private lenders, and this condition of affairs continued until the 
middle of the eighties or until national banks came to be more widely 
established. 

Although Reconstruction as a political condition ended at the close 
of 1873, and though the financial policy came under the control of 
new hands at the beginning of that year, the finances, industry and 
commerce of the state were slow in recovering from the effects of 
the war and radical rule, and it was 1880 before a normal condition 
was again reached. The period treated in this study, however, ex¬ 
tends from the close of the war through August 31, 1874. . . . 

The salient features of the Reconstruction financial period of 
Texas history are the large growth of expenditures, the great increase 
in taxation, and the rapid accumulation of a comparatively heavy debt. 
The finances do not indicate the rule, however, of such venal and 
pillaging adventurers as infested other southern states with carpet-bag 
governments. At the same time there was more open abuse of public 
trust than at any other period of the state’s history. An adjutant- 
general was guilty of defalcation of about $30,000; the funds of the 
treasury department were used for a time to abet private ends and 
its books fell into reckless disorder; petty jobbery existed in sup¬ 
plying state institutions, and bribery was charged on high authority 


530 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

to have been instrumental in securing the subsidy to the International 
Railroad. 

II. The Period of Recovery, 1874-1880 

Richard Coke was inaugurated governor on January 15, 1874, 
which event marked the political end of the Republican regime and 
of the Reconstruction in Texas. 

Although a tax rate of fifty cents had been imposed since 1871 
and bonds had been issued to meet the expense of frontier defence 
and to cover deficiencies in the ordinary revenues, an empty treasury 
and a rapidly increasing floating debt confronted the new Democratic 
administration. There was only $37,137.00 in the treasury available 
for general purposes, and the net receipts to accrue from taxes by 
September 1, 1874, were estimated at $481,714.00, while the expendi¬ 
tures were estimated at $1,236,116.00. There were, in addition, claims 
of school teachers for services rendered prior to July 1, 1873, amount¬ 
ing to over $400,000.00, an unexecuted cash pension law, and a harass¬ 
ing controversy with the International Railroad over a bond subsidy. 

The state’s financial problem was difficult, and its solution called 
for intelligence, courage, and patience. Immediate clarification and 
settlement were not possible, for though legislation could accomplish 
something, it was indispensable that there should be time for the 
recuperation of the industrial and commercial forces which had been 
depressed by the war, the Reconstruction, and the prostrating panic 
of 1873. Additional taxation as a way out was inexpedient in view 
of the already unpopular height of the tax rate, and bonds could 
not be immediately sold except at an almost prohibitive discount. The 
means of relief to the treasury which were adopted were the stop¬ 
page of payment of warrants dated before January 15, 1874, the use 
of special trust funds, and the issue of bonds. The treasury did not 
get on an actual cash basis, however, until the spring of 1879. Each 
year between 1874 and 1879 saw treasury deficits, the state’s warrants 
at a discount, the maintenance of the same high tax rate, an increase 
in the bonded debt to meet the ordinary expenses of government, and 
parsimony in expenditures for charitable, educational and other de¬ 
velopmental purposes. 

Industrially a new era began in 1879, as that was the year when 
there was generally throughout the country a marked upward move¬ 
ment indicating the completion of industrial recovery from the panic 
of 1873. The population of the state grew from 818,579 in 1870 
to 1,581,749 in 1880. This was a percentage of increase during the 
decade of 94.5 as compared with 35.5 during the preceding decade. 
Negroes numbered 393,384 in 1880 and constituted 24.7 per cent of 
the total population as compared with 30.9 per cent in 1870. The 
population was preponderantly rural, only 8.5 per cent living in 
towns of 2,500 population and over. The density of population re- 


ECONOMIC HISTORY OF TEXAS 


531 


mained small, though there was an increase from 3.1 in 1870 to 6.1 
in 1880. 

Agriculture engaged 68.8 per cent of the population ten years of 
age and over employed in all occupations. Agriculture showed a 
marked improvement in condition in 1880 over 1870. Though the 
number of farms increased 185 per cent and the acreage in farms 
increased 97.3 per cent, the percentage increase in the improved acre¬ 
age was 326.6. A large part of the land area of the state was un¬ 
occupied and uncultivated, however, as shown by the fact that the 
farm area was only 21.6 per cent of the total land area of the state. 
The vast area of land not in farms was either owned by the state or 
was privately owned and held as a speculation. The value of farm 
land and buildings amounted to $170,468,886 in 1880, which was an 
increase of 254.2 per cent over 1870. Farm implements and machinery 
showed an increase of 233.1 per cent, and domestic animals, poultry 
and bees an increase of 155.7 per cent. The value of livestock was 
$60,307,987 in 1880 as compared with $37,425,794 in 1870. 

Agriculture and stockraising were the chief sources of wealth to 
the state. Mining was negligible, and manufacturing was not advanc¬ 
ing in a remarkable way. The number of manufacturing establish¬ 
ments increased only 25 per cent, and the value of the products in¬ 
creased from $11,517,302 to $20,719^928 between 1870 and 1880. The 
percentage of growth in the value of the products was 79.9, or less 
than that in population. 

Under the liberal land grant policy which was in effect from 1873 
to 1882 railroad mileage grew rapidly. The increase between 1870 
and 1880 was from 711 miles to 3,244, and that between 1873 and 
1882 was from 1,578 to 6,009. 

Statistics for the growth of state banking are not available, but 
those for the national banking system do not show a rapid growth 
of that system. The number of national banks increased from 4 
in 1870 to 13 in 1880, and their deposits from $575,000 to $1,579,000. 

A new era also in the state’s finances began in 1879, due in no 
small part to the country’s prosperity, but also to a vigorous financial 
policy. The important features of this policy were the refunding and 
payment of the public debt, the sale of the public lands, changes in 
the administration of taxes, the adoption of new business taxes, and 
reduction in expenditures. The policy adopted in 1879 was known 
as the “pay-as-you-go” policy, and the most striking, and at the same 
time the most effective, of the measures relating to expenditures 
which were adopted to institute this policy was the reduction of the 
school fund’s share of the general revenues from the customary one- 
fourth to one-sixth. The fiscal operations of the state government 
during the year 1880 evidence the advent of a new era and the final 
issuance from the financial slough into which the state entered in 
1861. 


532 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


III. The Period 1881-1915 

By 1880 Texas had emerged definitely from under the spell of 
depression cast by the Civil War, the Reconstruction, and the panic 
of 1873. Conditions which trace their origin to these unhappy periods 
persist, however, and tend to complicate many of the political and 
economic problems which engage the present generation. 

The growth of population during this period took Texas from 
out of the eleventh place and put her in 1910 into fifth place among 
the states. The decennial census figures were as follows: 


1880. *, 59**749 

1890. 2,235,527 

1900. 3,048,710 

1910. 3*896,542 


The negro element in the population declined relatively, its per¬ 
centage of the total being 24.7 in 1880, 21.8 in 1890, 20.4 in 1900, and 

17.7 in 1910. Negroes numbered 393,384 in 1880, 488,171 in 1890, 
620,722 in 1900, and 690,049 in 1910. In 165 counties out of a total 
of 245, the percentage of negroes of the population was less than 12.5. 
These were mainly the Panhandle and the western and southwestern 
counties, or the newer, more sparsely settled and non-cotton-growing 
counties. In only eight counties, in 1910, was the percentage of 
negroes over 50, whereas in 1900 this was true in the case of thirteen 
counties. In those counties in which negroes are numerous they are 
an asset as a labor force, but otherwise they are a heavy social liability. 
They accumulate little property, they are an unskilled and indifferent 
class of laborers, and the expense of their policing and education falls 
almost wholly upon the whites. 

The population of Texas is very largely rural, and though the 
urban element is increasing, the change is not at a rapid rate. In 
1890 the rural percentage of the population was 84.4, in 1900 it was 
82.9, and in 1910 it was 75.9. The density of population was 6.1 
persons to the square mile in 1880 and 14.8 persons in 1910. 

Agriculture in 1910 engaged 60 per cent of the population ten 
years of age and over employed in all occupations, as compared with 

68.8 per cent in 1880, 64.3 per cent in 1890, and 62.4 per cent in 1900. 
Since 1880 the expansion of agriculture resulted in a large part of 
the area of the state being reclaimed from a state of uselessness to one 
of production. In 1880 21.6 per cent of the land area was in farms; 
in 1890, 30.6 per cent; in 1900, 74.9 per cent; and in 1910, 67 per cent. 
The decline between 1900 and 1910 was due to the fact that land 
which was used for grazing in 1900 and which was classified under 
farm land had been cut into small tracts by 1910, and at this latter 
date these tracts were owned by speculators or others who withheld 
them from use, which prevented them from being classified as farm 






ECONOMIC HISTORY OF TEXAS 


533 


land. During this period the Panhandle, the western and the south¬ 
western parts of Texas were brought into the area of cultivation. 
While the per cent of lands in farms greatly increased, the percentage 
of this area which was improved declined. In 1880 34.9 per cent 
of farm land was improved and the percentage in 1910 was only 24.3. 
But there was, of course, an enormous increase in the absolute acre¬ 
age of improved land. The acreage of such was 12,650,314 in 1880 
and 27,360,666 in 1910. 

Remarkable increases occurred in the value of farm property 
during the period 1880-1910. The values of lands and buildings 
were $170,468,886 in 1880, $399,971,289 in 1890, $691,773,613 in 
1900, and $1,843,203,395 in 1910. The value of livestock was $339,- 
433,843 in 1910, as compared with $60,307,987 in 1880. 

The statistics for manufacturing are not comparable farther back 
than 1899. The value of the products of manufactures increased 
from $92,894,000 in 1899 to $272,896,000 in 1909. In 1909 the num¬ 
ber of persons ten years of age and over engaged in manufacturing 
and mechanical industries was 184,396, as compared with 934,140 
in agriculture. The manufactures which led in values of products 
in 1909 were those whose finished products were not far removed 
from the raw material stage, such as slaughtering and meat packing, 
flour and grist milling, the manufacture of lumber and of timber 
products, and the manufacture of cottonseed oil and cake. There 
was not much pure manufacturing carried on in 1909, by which is 
meant manufactures which are far removed from the raw material 
stage. The gross value of the products of mining enterprises—that 
is, mines, quarries, and wells—was $10,742,150 in 1909. Petroleum 
and natural gas accounted for $6,356,000, or 59.4 per cent of the 
total. The oil industry has developed mainly since 1900. The value 
of the bituminous coal mined in 1909 was $3,136,004. 

Though manufacturing and mining increased considerably between 
1880 and 1910, Texas was in 1910 predominantly agricultural. In 
value of products, capital invested, and population engaged, agricul¬ 
ture far outdistanced other occupations. 

The growth of banking in Texas is one of the best evidences of 
the material development of the state. In 1880 there were in the 
state only 13 national banks, with a total capital of $1,579,000, and 
deposits of $2,081,000. In 1890 the number of banks was 189, the 
capital and surplus amounted to $25,760,000, and deposits were $30,- 
450,000. In 1900 the number of banks had increased to only 223, 
with capital and surplus of $25,337,000 and deposits of $49,749,000. 
The greatest increase took place after 1900, and was due to the modi¬ 
fications in the national bank act in 1900, to the incorporation of state 
banks, and to prosperous times. In 1915 there were 535 national 
banks, with a combined capital and surplus of $81,208,000, and with 
demand and time deposits of $185,100,000. 

The incorporation of state banks began in 1905. An amendment 


534 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


to the state constitution removed the ban which had existed since 
1876. The number grew rapidly on account of the low minimum 
capital requirements ($10,000) and the law guaranteeing demand de¬ 
posits. In September, 1905, there were 29 state banks, with a capital 
and surplus of $1,936,000, and demand and time deposits of $1,701,- 
832. By 1915 there were 835 state banks and trust companies, their 
combined capital stock and surplus was $39>575>73^> an( ^ they had 
demand and time deposits of $77> 2 53>o 2 7- The development of 
banking has made easier the taxation of loanable funds, inasmuch 
as such funds are more readily reached when in the control of cor¬ 
porations than when they are in the hands of private lenders. 

Railroad mileage amounted to 3,244 in 1880, 8,710 in 1890, 9,867 
in 1900, and 15,635 in 1915. Though the absolute mileage was very 
large in 1915, there were only 5.9 miles of line to each 100 square 
miles of area of the state. In 1880 there were 1.2 miles of line to 
each 100 square miles of area. In 1882 the policy of land grants 
by the state in aid of railroad construction came to an end. The 
important construction since 1880 was that which opened up the Pan¬ 
handle and the southwest and made possible the expansion of agri¬ 
culture into those sections. 


IV. Problems of State Finance 

[This selection constitutes the concluding chapter of Professor Miller’s 
book. The problems which he stated in 1915 are little changed to-day (1929), 
when these Readings are compiled.] 

Attention may now be directed to some of the financial needs of 
the state. The growing importance of government is shown in Texas 
in the, growth of state expenditures. Though there is complaint about 
public expeditures, Texas is not doing as much as some other states 
in proportion to her ability. The following table, compiled from the 
United States Census, shows the relative standing of some selected 
states in 1913, and the amounts given are the combined expenditures 
of the state, counties, towns and other local subdivisions per $1,000 
of taxable wealth at its full or true value. 

Complaints as to expenditures are in some cases unintelligent and 
are mouthed about for political effect, but in the majority of instances 
the complaints do not so much represent antipathy to the purposes of 
the expenditures as they do dissatisfaction with the revenue system 
and public officials. By reason of the breakdown of the general prop¬ 
erty tax, the weight of taxation falls increasingly on the owners of 
real property, until in the cities the description of taxes as burdens is 
not inappropriate. Real property owners feel that there is injustice 
in this, and consequently oppose proposals which will mean additional 
taxation whose benefits are not obvious, immediate, and personal. 


ECONOMIC HISTORY OF TEXAS 


535 


Public officials are too frequently looked upon as mere “office-holders,” 
and there is lack of confidence in their ability to get for the public the 
most out of the money raised for public use. The two greatest finan¬ 
cial problems which Texas has are to secure an equitable system of 
taxation and an efficient body of administrators. These are the prob¬ 
lems of government in all of the American states and cities, but Texas 
has been more indifferent toward them than have many other states, 
and has farther to go in solving them. 



Con¬ 
servation, 
Sanitation, 
and Public 
Health 

Charitable 
and Cor¬ 
rectional 

Education, 

Libraries, 

and 

Recreation 

Highways 

Protection 
to Persons 
and 

Property 

California. 

$0.30 

fo.88 

$ 4-95 

$1.16 

$2.65 

Massachusetts. 

1.19 

2.38 

4-51 

1.77 

3.88 

Tennessee. 

•33 

i -39 

348 

1.04 

2.05 

Wisconsin. 

•38 

1.08 

3-07 

.66 

1.90 

New York. 

.78 

1.22 

2.96 

1.07 

3-25 

Georgia. 

.60 

.92 

2.80 

1.82 

2.21 

Missouri. 

.40 

.76 

2.16 

•93 

2-35 

Colorado. 

•25 

•55 

2.11 

•93 

2.49 

Texas. 

.18 

.46 

1.86 

•74 

1.46 

Oklahoma. 

.06 

•24 

.83 

.20 

1.29 


The present state constitution is becoming a patchwork, and an 
entirely new one should be framed. The constitutional provisions 
relating to taxation, the public debt, and the selection and compensa¬ 
tion of public officials were laid down in 1875. At that time intangible 
personal property was relatively less important than it is now, the cor¬ 
poration was not as great a factor as at present, the urban element in the 
population was much smaller than now, and the conditions generally 
for the successful operation of the general property tax were, while 
bad enough, more favorable than they now are. In that year also, 
owing to the effects of the Civil War, the Reconstruction, and the 
panic of 1873, economy of the narrowest kind, in both public and 
private affairs, was a grinding necessity, and this was reflected in the 
binding restrictions upon the taxing and debt creating powers of the 
state government. In continuing to adhere to the general property 
tax, with its uniform rate upon all classes of property and with its 
decentralized system of administration, Texas is in the rearguard 
of the American states as respects methods of taxation. It is almost 
incomprehensible that in this year of the twentieth century there should 
be a state in which the complicated properties of railroads are as¬ 
sessed for the most part in piecemeal by local assessors, and in which 




















536 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


there is no state supervision of these assessors in their assessment of 
the property of either individuals or corporations. 

Various proposals have been made in and out of the legislature 
to cure the evils complained of. As a remedy for the varying pro¬ 
portions of assessed to true values among the counties separation of 
state and local revenues has been more advocated in Texas than has 
any other remedy. Only the complete withdrawal of the state from 
the taxation of real estate would make this remedy effective against 
the particular defect of the tax system to which it is applicable, but 
in view of state support of the public free schools, and the desirability 
of the continuance and extension of such support, abandonment of the 
real estate tax by the state does not seem likely. Separation of sources 
of revenue is not a reform measure which is employed to any great 
extent by other states, and the tendency seems to be away from it 
rather than towards it. Even if it were a desirable reform measure 
for Texas, it would not be possible without a constitutional amend¬ 
ment. 

If the property tax is retained as a state tax, some system of 
state control over assessments should be adopted. Decentralization 
of administration has failed in taxation in Texas as it failed in the 
administration of the public lands. Centralization should succeed 
decentralization, and the state board or commission should have the 
power to supervise assessments of property for state taxation, should 
have authority over assessors and collectors, and should assess the 
property of corporations which, like railroads, express companies, 
telegraph and telephone companies, do a state-wide business. The 
present state tax board is deficient in power and is wrongly consti¬ 
tuted. 

A central tax board or commission will not remedy the evil of 
the escape of personal property, especially of intangible personalty, 
from taxation. The weakness of the system which employs property 
as an index of ability to pay taxes is nowhere better exhibited than 
in connection with the taxation of personal property. Some of it 
should not be subject to taxation at all, for there results therefrom 
a vicious variety of double taxation. The taxation of vendor’s lien 
notes and of the property which secures them, for example, is double 
taxation of an indefensible kind. Texas avoids similar double taxa¬ 
tion in other cases; thus the shares of stock of domestic corporations 
are not liable to assessment when the property of the corporation is 
subject to assessment in the state, and there is no double taxation 
of bank stock and bank property. The Texas laws do not carry 
out the principle of exemption to its logical conclusion, for there 
is no valid reason for treating differently stocks on the one hand, 
and bonds and credits, such as vendor’s lien notes, on the other. 
An interesting situation will exist as a result of the provision in 
the Federal Farm Loan Act which exempts from Federal, state and 


ECONOMIC HISTORY OF TEXAS 


537 


other taxation any mortgage executed to a Federal land bank. If 
this exemption provision stands, some farm mortgages will be tax¬ 
able while others will be exempt. 

Property as a measure of ability to pay taxes is inferior to in¬ 
come, and tax systems will work injustice until income takes the 
place of property as a basis. An income tax should distinguish 
between income from property and income from personal exertion, 
and, in accordance with modern notions of justice in taxation, the 
former and all funded income should be taxed at a higher rate than 
the latter. Real property should also continue to be liable for special 
assessment for improvements which are directly beneficial to it, and 
a moderate use of the land increment tax would be in accord with 
modern tendencies. The greatest obstacle to income taxation in the 
United States is inefficient administration, but Wisconsin is setting an 
example to the other states with her central supervisory board and 
her district assessors appointed according to the merit system. The 
assessors should be removed from local influences, but they should 
have the benefit of the knowledge of local boards. There should be 
cooperation between the state and national governments in the assess¬ 
ment of the income tax, and there should be a division of the yield 
of the tax between the state and local governments. 

The constitution of Texas provides for an income tax, but in 
general the tax provisions of the constitution are obsolete. They do 
not permit separation of sources, or classification of property for 
purposes of taxation, or state supervision of assessment, or other 
methods of tax reforms which have been employed by the states 
of the United States and foreign countries. Another tax reform 
which has been advocated in Texas is “home rule” or “local option” 
in taxation. This would permit towns and cities to adopt such taxes 
as they saw fit. The state cannot afford to disassociate itself from all 
concern with local taxation, as this reform proposes, and for the 
reason principally that it must protect its own sources of revenue. 
Those proposing this reform are, as a rule, single taxers or advocates 
of partial exemption of improvements from taxation, neither of which 
proposals is just in the eyes of those who believe that every person 
should contribute to the support of the government in accordance 
with his ability, and that income is the best index of ability. The 
single tax is not a tax measure, but is a social reform measure which 
includes the feature of government confiscation of the rent of land. 
It is not to be judged, therefore, as a fiscal measure, but those who 
insist that it should be so judged must meet the objections that it is 
a confiscatory measure and that the concept of income as a basis for 
taxation is more comprehensive, just, and adequate. 

The exemption of the homestead from taxation is another pro¬ 
posed reform. The homestead law of Texas is already too liberal 
without this addition. Under a system of taxation in which the 


538 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


income tax is the principal tax and the property tax is a supplemen¬ 
tary tax, it might be desirable to exempt real property up to a certain 
amount, but exemption under any other condition would be difficult 
to defend. Under the existing methods of taxation in Texas the 
small property owner is undoubtedly discriminated against, but the 
remedy is not the exemption of his homestead, but it is, so long 
as the property tax is retained, the fuller taxation of the larger 
owner and the abandonment of the discrimination in favor of acreage 
property and vacant lots. 

The provisions of the Texas constitution relating to the state debt 
reflect the political, economic, and financial conditions which existed 
in 1875. Distrust of the legislative and executive branches of the 
government is shown in the small amount of debt which may be 
incurred, except under extraordinary conditions of war, insurrection, 
or invasion. This amount, $200,000, reflects also the hard times exist¬ 
ing in 1875. There should be some provision against the frequent 
deficits in the treasury which work such hardships upon the employees 
and creditors of the state. Authority should be given the treasury 
to make temporary loans to an amount sufficient to avoid deficiencies, 
or the warrants of the state should draw interest until they are called 
for payment. 

A more sensible system of appropriations should be adopted, and 
to this end the governor and representatives of both branches of the 
legislature should act together as a budget council or committee in 
arriving at the needs of the various institutions and departments of 
the public service, in estimating the future revenue, and in framing 
the appropriation measure. 1 The result of their work would be a 
budget which should be submitted to the legislature, and there should 
be limitations in the changes which the legislature might make and 
on the veto powers of the governor. There certainly should be a 
change from the existing arrangement under which the appropria¬ 
tion measure is one of the last measures to pass the legislature before 
final adjournment, with the result that the governor’s veto of items 
goes unchallenged. 

However laudable the purposes of public expenditures and how¬ 
ever generous the provision for them, there will be waste and ineffec¬ 
tive service, unless the public officials are honest and capable. There 
will never be satisfactory public officials until the “spoils system” is 
done away with, and the public service is looked upon as a pro¬ 
fession. Those who follow this profession should be trained for it, 
they should be chosen for their fitness, and they should have security 
of tenure. The accounts of public officials who handle public funds 
should be regularly audited, and for this work an expert force of 

1 This suggestion has been met in part by creation of the Board of Control, 
which prepares the biennial budget for the legislature. 


ECONOMIC HISTORY OF TEXAS 


539 


auditors is necessary. These auditors might also be expected to 
study methods of organization and conduct of the public business. 

In conclusion, it may be observed that the responsibility for the 
shortcomings of the financial system and of government generally 
and the hope of their betterment lie with the average citizen. He 
has no one to blame but himself, and there will be no important re¬ 
form until he ceases to be individualistic, ignorant, and indifferent 
as regards public affairs. 


CHAPTER XLII 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 

By Charles S. Potts 

[The selections which follow in this chapter are from Potts, Railroad Trans¬ 
portation in Texas, Chapters I, II, and V (University of Texas Bulletin, 1909). 
The first section gives an excellent brief description of transportation conditions 
and problems before the coming of the railroads; the second traces in sum¬ 
mary fashion the growth of railroad mileage in Texas down to 1909, the date 
when Professor Potts’s book was published; the third describes the various 
measures by which cities, counties, and the state have encouraged and assisted 
railroad building in Texas. Chapters of Professor Potts’s study omitted from 
these Readings describe the rise of a public demand for the regulation of rail¬ 
roads by law and the creation of the Texas Railroad Commission in response 
to that demand. See Briscoe, “The First Railroad in Texas,” in Quarterly of 
Texas State Historical Association, VII, 279-286. Read: Barker, Potts, and 
Ramsdell, A School History of Texas, 305-311.] 


I. Transportation Conditions Before the Coming of 
Railways 

1. Inland Water Communication 

The greatest obstacle which had to be overcome by the early 
Anglo-American settlers in Texas was the almost total lack of means 
of communication and transportation. At this time there were three 
small centers of Spanish population within the limits of the State, 
at La Bahia, now Goliad, Bexar, now San Antonio, and Nacogdoches, 
but they were widely separated and the roads by which they were 
connected were no more than blazed, trails, sufficient only to guide 
the traveler to the fords of the rivers. For the rest, Texas was a 
wilderness, and some five hundred miles of unoccupied territory 
separated it from the frontier settlements in the United States, at 
New Orleans, Natchez, Memphis, and St. Louis. To reach the State, 
the early settler was forced either to transport his family and house¬ 
hold effects overland across this unsettled area, or to resort to the 
uncertainties and dangers of Gulf and river navigation. Nor were 
his difficulties in this respect materially lessened upon his arrival in 
the country. As soon as his first crop was gathered he was forced to 
seek a market for his surplus products, especially his cotton; and it 

540 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


541 


was with very great difficulty that the country was supplied with cloth¬ 
ing and other necessary articles of importation. 

A glance at the map of Texas might lead one to suppose that 
the State is well supplied with navigable rivers. Unfortunately this 
is not true. Outside of the Rocky Mountain region, there is probably 
no other North American area as large as Texas that is so poorly 
supplied with navigable streams. The rivers of the State are long 
enough and at times carry tremendous volumes of water, but the flow 
is so uncertain during many months in the year that navigation is 
impossible except for short distances near the mouths of the streams. 

The commercial use to which the rivers of Texas have been put 
has varied greatly at different times in the State’s history. In the 
early days before the railroad era, when the choice of the settler lay 
between the river boat and the ox-cart, the rivers were of considerable 
commercial importance. The Red River supplied an outlet to New 
Orleans for the northeastern portion of the State, the traffic of this 
section passing out by way of the town of Jefferson, down Cypress 
Bayou, across Lake Caddo to the Red River. Navigation above this 
point on the Red River was interfered with by what was known as 
the Great Raft, an accumulation of drift wood which blocked the 
channel for many miles near the town of Fulton, Arkansas. Above 
the Raft small boats were used as far up as Preston in Grayson 
county. 

In South Texas, most of the commerce of the coast country passed 
in and out along the rivers and arms of the sea. Before Texas re¬ 
volted from Mexico, a steamboat was making regular trips on the 
Brazos, and in the early fifties the Galveston and Brazos Navigation 
Company opened a canal connecting Galveston bay with the Brazos, 
thus bringing the products of Brazoria and adjacent counties to the 
wharf at Galveston. In this way it was estimated that a saving of 
$50,000 annually in freights and insurance was effected. Richmond 
was at the head of regular navigation, though occasional trips were 
made as far up as old Washington, near the present site of Hemp¬ 
stead. Galveston Bay and Buffalo Bayou furnished water connections 
between Houston and Galveston, and four steamboats were engaged 
in this trade as early as 1838/ The Trinity river was regularly nav¬ 
igated to Liberty, seventy-five miles from Galveston, and occasionally 
as far up as Magnolia, some ten miles west of Palestine, but Rankin’s 
statement that “the river may be successfully navigated with but little 
difficulty from six to nine months in the year, for 300 miles by land, 
and 500 by the course of the river,” seems to have been one of those 
loose exaggerations of which we find many in the early descriptions of 
Texas and her resources. 

The Sabine Lake and the Neches and Sabine rivers furnished a 
modicum of transportation facilities for the lumber and cotton of the 
southeastern section of the State. The situation in this region is well 


542 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


stated in a letter written in 1843 by S. H. Everett to Anson Jones, 
afterwards President of the Republic. He said: 

There must be some place for the receiving and forwarding of the cotton 
of Texas at the mouths of the Neches and Sabine. The Sabine pass is not 
suitable, because flat boats coming down the river cannot cross the lake with 
safety and that, and keel boats, are the only kinds of boats that can at this 
time come down the river Neches, and it will require much labor before steam¬ 
boats can navigate the river. Cotton can be brought down the river from Jasper 
county at an expense of $1.00 per bale, and from Nacogdoches for $1.50 to 
$2.00; while the expense of shipping to Natchitoches (on the Red River in 
Louisiana) is from $5.00 to $7.50 per bale, and the expense on a bale of cotton 
shipped to New Orleans from Natchitoches is quite as much as it would be 
to ship the bale of cotton from Sabine Lake to New Orleans, or to Galveston. 

The facilities for navigation on the southwestern coast were con¬ 
fined mainly to the Gulf and its inlets, Matagorda, Aransas and 
Corpus Christi bays. The Colorado had at times been navigated as 
far up as Austin, but in 1850 Rankin reports that “steam-boating is 
not now successfully prosecuted on account of the unimproved con¬ 
dition of the channel.” The Guadalupe was used occasionally up to 
Victoria, and steamboats plied on the Rio Grande as far up as Rio 
Grande City, though Rankin assures us that “the stream at present 
is navigated by steamboats to a distance of about 500 miles.” 

2. Early Attempts at River Improvement 

Prior to the Civil War the State made at least one serious attempt 
to improve the Texas rivers and bays along the coast so as to render 
them more serviceable to the rapidly increasing trade of the State. As 
early as 1839 the treasurer of the Republic paid from his empty 
coffers a warrant for $520 expended in surveying the harbors on the 
Gulf coast. In his message to the Fourth Congress, November 12, 
1839, President Lamar urged the establishment of a new department, 
to be known as the Home Department, one of whose duties should be 
the supervision of the proposed road building and river improvement. 
In 1852 a bill was introduced into the State Senate appropriating 
some $250,000 for river improvement. Four years later the work 
was entered upon in earnest, the treasury stringency having been re¬ 
lieved by the money received from the Federal Government as a result 
of the adjustment of the New Mexico boundary dispute. An act was 
passed in 1856, carrying a total sum of $315,000 to be used on river 
and harbor improvement. It provided for the appointment of a State 
Engineer, who was to have control of the work and who, with the 
Governor and Comptroller, composed a board for apportioning the 
funds to the various projects. Each locality was required to raise by 
subscription one-fourth the amount allotted to it by the board. 

The following table shows the contracts approved by the board 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


543 


up to 1858. Two or three other places had raised the required funds 
and their contracts were pending: 


River 


Section 


Consideration 


Gaudalupe.Mouth to Victoria . 

Western Bays.Matagorda Bay to Aransas and Guada¬ 
lupe rivers . 

San Jacinto.Clopper’s Bar . 

Trinity.Bar at mouth... 

Brazos .Mouth to Washington. 

Colorado .Canal around raft . 

Colorado .From raft to Wharton. 

Cypress Bayou.Jefferson to State Line. 

Oyster Creek .Canal to Retrieve.. 

Sabine .Up to Logansport. 

Galveston Bay.To Canal and Red Fish. 


$22,850 

57,500 

22,725 

15, 120 

50,000 

35 , 00 ° 

11,250 

21,298 

3,833 

3L455 

23,000 


This work progressed satisfactorily during the next two or three 
years and by the beginning of the Civil War river navigation had 
reached its high-water mark. In 1859, a writer says: 

A considerable portion of the cotton made in Shelby county was shipped 
down the Sabine river this season. The people in this section of the country, 
in view of the improvements going on to open up the Sabine river, are much 
pleased with the probability of being able hereafter to turn their entire trade 
to New Orleans and Galveston, through this channel. . . . The steamer Uncle 
Ben made five successful trips, two of which were as high up as Smith county, 
a distance of nearly 800 miles, carrying out nearly 1000 bales of cotton each 
trip. Also the Pearl Plant and other boats have done considerable in the 
Sabine trade, and without the least difficulty from leaning timbers. ... I have 
no doubt that 60,000 or 70,000 bales of cotton will find its way to market next 
season through this channel to New Orleans and Galveston. 


With the outbreak of the Civil War, the efforts at river and harbor 
improvement ceased and all the energies of government and people 
were turned in another direction. As a result the channels became 
clogged, commerce declined and river navigation almost ceased. After 
the war there were a few attempts by private parties to clear the 
rivers and revive the river trade, but they were only partially success¬ 
ful. 1 The rapid construction of railways after 1870 largely removed 
the incentive to river improvement. Most of the streams have ceased 
to be factors in the transportation problem of the State, though con¬ 
siderable quantities of cotton, lumber and other low grade freight 

1 A writer in Flake's Bulletin, February 4, 1869, says that a company was 
chartered by the Legislature in 1866 and had opened up the Neches river to 
Holly’s Bluff in Trinity county and proposed to open it immediately to Shook’s 
Bluff in Cherokee county. Dr. O. Teagarden, president of the company, was 
then in Galveston to purchase a steamer to put on the river. 
























544 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


are still floated down the rivers to the Gulf ports. It remains to 
be seen whether the efforts at canalization, now being made by the 
United States Government, will succeed in making the Trinity, the 
Brazos, and other Texas rivers successful rivals of the railroads. 

5 . Overland Trade and Travel 

Before the advent of the railway, overland trade and travel were 
accomplished by means of the ox-wagon and stagecoach. The roads 
were few and poor; road building for the most part consisted merely 
of clearing the brush from the right of way and log-bridging such 
streams as could not be conveniently forded. Several efforts were 
made by the Republic to build national highways. In 1838, com¬ 
missioners were appointed to open a road from Bastrop by way of 
the upper three forks of the Trinity to a point on the Red River to 
be selected not below Spanish Bluff nor above the Cross Timbers. 
In 1839, House passed a bill to reopen the old road from San 
Antonio to Nacogdoches, but it died in the Senate. Another House 
bill, providing for opening a national road from Washington on the 
Brazos to the Sabine, produced a very warm debate in the Senate. 
Several members opposed the bill because it appropriated for the 
enterprise $500 from the national treasury. Where was the money 
to come from? Said one patriot: “We have an army, a navy, and 
all the officers of government to pay, soldiers to clothe and feed, 
Mexicans and Indians to whip, and to guard our frontier—uses, in 
fact, for ten times as much money as we can raise.” Others opposed 
it because they believed it was an attempt at class legislation, and 
that it was prompted by the local greed and grasping spirit of Jasper 
county. The result was that when the bill became a law the $500 
appropriation had been eliminated and the counties were left to open 
the road at their own expense. Another attempt at highway building 
occurred in 1844 when Congress provided for opening the “Central 
National Road of the Republic of Texas.” It was to run from the 
mouth of the Elm Fork of the Trinity to a point on Red River 
opposite the mouth of the Kiamisha. The road was to be located and 
surveyed and then let out to contractors, who were to be paid for 
their work by a grant of public lands, provided that the cost of the 
road should not exceed one hundred and sixty acres of land to the 
mile. The road was to be thirty feet wide, the bridges fifteen feet 
wide, and the stumps not more than twelve inches high. 

As the population increased, the counties gradually opened roads 
to accommodate the traveling public, and private stage lines were 
established between the principal towns. These stage lines were the 
forerunners of the railways, and served as models for the early rail¬ 
road companies. They were usually owned by an individual or com¬ 
pany called the “Contractor.” The roads over which the stagecoaches 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


545 


traveled were generally laid out and surveyed by the Contractor, but 
they were kept in repair by the counties through which they passed. 
Depots were established in all the important towns on the routes and 
tickets for transportation were sold as is done by the railroad com¬ 
panies of today. The teams consisted of from four to six horses 
or mules. An average speed of five to eight miles per hour was made, 
but it is said that in bad weather the passengers were sometimes 
compelled to walk and prize mud from the wheels. Fresh teams 
were secured from time to time at stations scattered along the route 
and taverns and eating stands were provided for the refreshment of 
the passengers. The usual cost of transportation was ten cents per 
mile, each passenger being allowed a small amount of hand baggage. 

The number of stage lines in Texas probably reached a maximum 
limit about i860. The Texas Almanac of that date shows thirty-one 
distinct stage lines, forming a perfect net-work of lines that covered 
all the settled portions of the State. It is a matter of interest to 
note that a strong tendency toward consolidation had made itself felt 
even at this early date, for we find that one concern, the firm of 
Sawyer, Risher, and Hall, controlled sixteen of the thirty-one lines. 
They were believed to be the largest mail contractors in the United 
States, owning many lines in Louisiana as well as most of those in 
Texas, and employing three hundred men and one thousand mules and 
horses. 

In addition to the thirty-one lines lying within the State there 
were two long distance lines in operation that deserve mention. One 
extended from Sherman to Fort Smith, Arkansas, where it made 
connection with a line to St. Louis. The through trip from Sherman 
to St. Louis was made in four and one-half days, traveling day and 
night. This line also extended from Sherman to Fort Concho, near 
the Rio Grande, where it made connection with the line from San 
Antonio to San Diego, California. 

This latter route from San Antonio to San Diego was one of 
the longest overland stage lines ever established, covering a total 
distance of fourteen hundred and seventy-six miles. It was opened 
in 1857 by Mr. J. E. Burch, of California, who secured a contract 
with the Post Office Department to carry the mails between the two 
places, semi-monthly trips to be made in four-horse coaches, the con¬ 
sideration being $149,000 annually. Although thirty days were allowed 
for the trip, the mails were rarely out over twenty-five days, twenty- 
three days being the average time required. The cost of a through 
passage was $200, all expenses being borne by the company. The 
stages were so arranged “that passengers could recline in them com¬ 
fortably and take their sleep while traveling.” In carrying out this 
contract the company employed sixty-five men, fifty coaches, and 
four hundred mules. The San Antonio and San Diego route was, 
without d doubt, the most practicable route to the Pacific, and, had 


546 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


it not been for the prejudices of the Civil War period, it would prob¬ 
ably have been chosen as the route for the first transcontinental rail¬ 
road. It is interesting to note how closely the old stage route was 
followed, fifteen years later, by the engineers of the Southern Pacific 
Railway Company. 

The transportation of freight was accomplished by means of ox 
freight-lines, which in general followed the routes used by the stage 
lines that led to the markets and seaports. A caravan of ox-wagons 
moved along at a very leisurely pace, depending on the grass along 
the way for the support of the teams. Many weeks and even months 
were required to deliver a cargo of cotton or buffalo hides at the 
market and to return to the interior with the sugar and coffee and 
manufactured goods required by the settlers. Before the opening of 
roads the cost of transportation was almost prohibitive. In 1842, 
President Houston assigns the cost of transportation, along with the 
danger from Indians and Mexican raiders, as a cause for the removal 
of the capital from Austin to some point near the sea-coast. “Dur¬ 
ing the last year,” said he, “the expense to the government for trans¬ 
portation to the city of Austin, over and above what it would have 
been to any point on the seaboard, exceeded seventy thousand dol¬ 
lars, and the extra cost of the transportation of the mail, aside from 
all other expense and inconvenience attending its remote and detached 
situation, amounts to many thousands more.” 

As the country became settled, however, “freighting” came to be 
a permanent occupation and furnished employment to a very consider¬ 
able portion of the population. The customary rate of charge was 
one dollar per hundred pounds per hundred miles, or twenty cents 
per ton-mile, if we express it in terms of the modern railway unit 
of work. As the present freight rate in Texas 18 is about one cent 
per ton-mile, it will be seen that the introduction of the railway has 
reduced the cost of transportation to about one-twentieth of what 
our fathers were compelled to pay. This heavy cost of transporta¬ 
tion was a tremendous handicap on the fertile black-land region of 
the central and northern sections of the State. The surplus wheat 
of this region, on account of the cost, could not be transported over 
a hundred and fifty miles, and either rotted in the fields or was fed 
to the stock. It was undoubtedly this lack of transportation facilities 
that caused this, the most fertile region of the State, to remain so 
long practically untouched, while the population fringed the Gulf and 
bays and navigable rivers in the southern and eastern sections. 2 

18 That is, in 1909. 

2 The Comptroller’s Report for 1850 shows sixteen counties whose assessed 
wealth exceeded one million dollars. They were all in South and East Texas 
and practically all were located on navigable water. Following are the assessed 
values for 1850 in some of the typical counties in Central and North Texas on 
the one hand and in South and East Texas on the other: 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


547 


4. Early Trade Districts and Trade Centers 

In the days of the “freighters,” Texas was divided geographically 
into five trade districts, each tributary to one or more market towns 
and seaports. The boundaries of these districts overlapped each other 
and shifted from time to time, but the districts were distinct and 
fairly definite. The most important of these districts was that tribu¬ 
tary to Houston and Galveston. Roughly speaking, it had the Neches 
for its eastern boundary and the Colorado for its western boundary, 
and it extended northward to the Red River. The region lying to 
the east of the Neches and south of Nacogdoches and Shelby counties 
sent most of its products to the Galveston and New Orleans markets 
by way of Sabine Pass, though at times considerable trade crossed 
the Sabine to Natchitoches and other Red River points for shipment 
to New Orleans. Lying west of the Colorado and south of Erath and 
Eastland counties was a great, relatively unsettled region whose chief 
market was San Antonio, and whose seaports were Port Lavaca, 
Indianola, Matagorda, Texana, Saluria, and Corpus Christi. The 
trade of the Rio Grande valley as far northward as the San Diego 
stage line, centered in Brownsville and Brazos Santiago. The fifth 
district stretched from the Red River across the northern portion of 
the State to the frontier counties in the west. Its chief market and 
port was the town of Jefferson, which was connected with the Red 
River by Cypress Bayou and Caddo Lake. Shreveport was a strong 


Central and North Assessed 

Texas Counties— Values. 

Bell. $96,000 

Collin . 159,000 

Cooke . 8,000 

Dallas . 145,000 

Denton. 16,000 

Ellis . 84,000 

Falls . 40,000 

Fannin . 538,000 

Grayson. 183,000 

Henderson . 10,000 

Hopkins. 227,000 

Hunt. 87,000 

Kaufman . 82,000 

Navarro. 266,000 

Tarrant . 30,000 

Williamson . 353,ooo 


Total .$2,324,000 


South and East Assessed 

Texas Counties— Values. 

Austin . $1,235,000 

Bexar . 1,069,000 

Brazoria. 3,236,000 

Fayette. 1,032,000 

Fort Bend . 1,060,000 

Cass . 1,022,000 

Galveston . 2,242,000 

Grimes . 1,208,000 

Harris . 1,676,000 

Harrison . 

Matagorda . i,3 2 3,ooo 

Nacogdoches. 1, 743 , 1000 

Rusk . i,7i7,ooo 

Red River . 1,002,000 

San Augustine . 1,587,000 

Washington. 2,102,000 


Total ..$26,353,000 


The total assessed wealth of the State for that year was $50,715,000, of which 
it will be seen more than one-half was located in the sixteen counties of South 
and East Texas, just enumerated. 







































548 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


rival of Jefferson, while Clarksville was the leading distributing point 
for the commerce on the Red River above the Great Raft. 

The rival cities of Houston and Galveston took their rise at the 
same time, during the period immediately following the Texas revolu¬ 
tion in 1836. Galveston has always been the chief seaport on the 
Texas coast, while Houston at the head of navigation on the Buffalo 
Bayou early came into prominence as a distributing center. In 1836 
Galveston had hardly one vessel per month. In 1838 vessels were 
coming and going daily and the imports during the first quarter of the 
year amounted to more than a quarter of a million dollars. A writer 
in the Houston Telegraph, June 16, 1838, says that Galveston then 
had fifty or sixty elegant buildings, where there had been only one 
twelve months before. In a public address, delivered in Galveston on 
June 29, 1839, Dr. Anson Jones, afterwards President of the Republic, 
said: 

I am happy, fellow citizens, to see the evidences of prosperity which now 
immediately surround the island of Galveston. It is but about eighteen months 
since the improvements commenced on this island; and now, after the lapse of 
so short a time, the city of Galveston, like Venice, the bride of the Adriatic, 
has arisen as if by enchantment from the waters, and smiles gloriously and 
beautifully upon the sea which surrounds her. Your population, which already 
amounts to near three thousand, is rapidly and constantly increasing. 

The population had grown to 5,000 in 1850 and to 15,000 in 1865, 
despite the ravages of the Civil War. The exports through the port 
of Galveston, which amounted to $23,000,000 in 1865, had grown to 
ten times that figure in 1907. 

Houston’s growth kept pace with that of Galveston until after the 
war. Then, as a result of its railway connections and the establish¬ 
ment of manufacturing enterprises, it gradually forged ahead in wealth 
and population, and as an inland trading center. 

The principal seaports for San Antonio and the region west of 
the Colorado were Port Lavaca and Indianola, rival towns on Mata¬ 
gorda Bay. 3 The population numbered about 3,000 and 2,000 respec¬ 
tively in i860. In that year Port Lavaca exported 30,000 bales of 
cotton and Indianola 28,600. Another rival port in this section was 
Corpus Christi, whose population in i860 was about 4,000. In 1875 
Indianola was completely overwhelmed by a great tropical storm 
similar to the one that visited Galveston in 1900. Today only a single 
boat house marks the spot where this flourishing seaport once stood. 

3 The so-called Cart War was an incident connected with this overland 
freight business between San Antonio and the seaports. In 1856 the people of 
Colorado county were thrown into a panic by the discovery of what seemed to 
be a well matured plan to produce a slave uprising. The Mexicans, who were 
numerous in that section, and who were largely engaged in the freight business 
between San Antonio and the coast, were accused of guilty complicity in the 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


549 


Brazos Santiago was mainly engaged in trade with Mexico, nearly 
four million dollars’ worth of imports coming from that country in 
1859. Of this amount, however, more than three million dollars con¬ 
sisted of silver bullion. Sabine Pass, on the other hand, was mainly 
engaged in the export trade. In 1859, the exports from this port were 
18,000 bales of cotton, 1,099,000 feet of lumber, 12,000,000 shingles, 
7,000 hoop poles, 97,000 staves, 5,669 beeves, and 23,700 pounds of 
tobacco. The imports during the same year were about 100,000 bar¬ 
rels of assorted merchandise. 

In the history of the early commercial struggles in Texas, there 
is no story more pathetic than the rise and decay of the town of 
Jefferson. Before the railway era it was by far the largest city and 
trading center in North Texas, and second only to Galveston as a ship¬ 
ping point. Cotton, wheat, hides, and lumber, all the surplus prod¬ 
ucts of a region as large as many of the States of the Union, sought 
their way, on slow-moving wagon trains, to the wharves of Jefferson, 
where they were loaded on small steamers that threaded their way 
through the tortuous channel of the Big Cypress, across Lake Caddo, 
and down the Red River to New Orleans and the commercial world 
beyond. On the return trip the steamers brought to Jefferson the man¬ 
ufactured goods of other sections and of foreign lands, which were 
distributed westward to Sherman, Dallas, Fort Worth and other 
frontier settlements to the foot of the plains. It is estimated that at 
one time one-fourth of the entire trade of the State passed through 
Jefferson. For the years 1859 and i860 the export cotton trade of 
Jefferson amounted to 88,000 bales and 100,000 bales respectively, 
while the exports from Galveston were 118,000 bales and 148,000 
bales for the same years. The wagon trade was so large “that the 
roads leading from the west were literally so blocked up with vehicles 
that passage was difficult.” 

But a change came with the building of railways into Jefferson’s 
trade district. In the early seventies, the completion of the Houston 
and Texas Central to Dallas and Sherman furnished an outlet to the 
Gulf, the main line of the Texas and Pacific gave an outlet to New 
Orleans by way of Shreveport, and the Transcontinental Branch, con¬ 
necting with the Iron Mountain at Texarkana, gave a direct line to 
St. Louis. The little river steamer and the ox-wagon proved no match 
for the locomotive. New commercial centers sprang up in the west 
and Jefferson’s wagon trade began to decline. Her enterprising busi¬ 
ness men made a strong fight to hold the trade they had so long 
enjoyed. They organized themselves into a railway company and built 
a narrow-gauge line west through Sulphur Springs to Greenville, and 
later to McKinney. They built a saw mill, an iron foundry, an oil 

proposed revolt. So, as a result, their wagon trains were attacked by lawless 
whites, their animals killed, and their goods carried away. Governor Pease was 
forced to order out the militia to restore order. 



550 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


refinery and a wagon factory. But they fought a losing battle. The 
Galveston News said, in 1881: 

The building of the Texas and Pacific worked an era of decline for Jefferson, 
which has depreciated her property seventy per cent since 1874 , forced half her 
population to move away, left her finest buildings without a tenant, and par¬ 
tially made her the Palmyra of Texas. Railroad competition for freight has 
forced steamboats out of the bayou, which they rarely or never ascend as in 
former days, but stop at Shreveport. 

Her population decreased from 12,000 in 1870 to less than 5,000 in 
1880, and to 3,000 in 1890. 

Clarksville had a career similar to that of Jefferson, but some¬ 
what less dramatic. A writer in the Galveston News of September 
1, 1881, says: 

This, the oldest town in Northern Texas, was begun in 1835, and up to i860 
continued the leading place in that section, and was such in 1842 when neither 
Paris, Dallas, nor Bonham had an existence. It was to North Texas what 
Jefferson was to the eastern part of the State, and commanded the trade of a 
most extended section, then but sparsely settled and little known. Before the 
days of railroads in Texas, Clarksville procured its supplies from New Orleans 
by way of Red River, steamboats delivering their cargoes at Rowland’s Land¬ 
ing, fifteen miles distant, from which point wagon transportation was used. 
Clarksville is said to have sold and distributed her goods as far west as El 
Paso. Like Jefferson, the trade of the town came to a stand-still simultaneously 
with the railroad era, because most of the country tributary to Clarksville then 
began to patronize other markets opened up. 

5. The Movement of Cattle 

One other phase of the early transportation system of Texas 
deserves a passing notice in this connection. Reference is here made 
to the transportation of cattle to the Northern prairies and to the 
markets. An important feature of this class of freight is that, in the 
absence of convenient means of shipment, it can be made to trans¬ 
port itself. So before the opening of railway routes to the North 
and East, the surplus beef cattle of the State were driven overland 
to markets five hundred to a thousand miles away. The cattle of 
Southern and Eastern Texas, with the exception of a small number 
that went by boat from Jefferson, Galveston and other seaports, were 
driven across the State of Louisiana to New Orleans. But the great 
cattle movement was “up the trail,” through the Panhandle country 
of Texas to Dodge City, Kansas. From there these stalwart Texan 
“long-horns” were usually scattered over the prairies of Kansas, 
Nebraska, and even as far northward as Montana and Minnesota, to 
be fattened, and driven later in the season to St. Louis, Kansas City, 
or Omaha for slaughter, or for trans-shipment to New York or 
Chicago. This overland movement to the Northern ranges reached 
a maximum in the early seventies when it is estimated that as many 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


551 


as 500,000 cattle were driven up the trail in a single season. With 
the opening of through railway lines to the North, the movement on 
the trail began to decline and had almost ceased by 1890. In 1879, 
about 257,000 were driven overland and 245,000 head were shipped 
out of the State by rail and water. 4 

II. The Development of the Railway Net 
1. Early Attempts at Railroad Construction 

The railway history of Texas begins simultaneously with the State’s 
existence as an independent republic. The first congress which met 
in the fall of 1836, launched the famous Texas Railroad, Navigation 
and Banking Company. This was about as wild an enterprise as one 
would expect to find in a new community, and it bears a striking 
resemblance to many of the reckless banking and transportation 
schemes that were foisted upon the people of the Western and South¬ 
ern States of the Union, in the great period of expansion and 
speculation just preceding the panic of 1837. The extravagance of 
the adventure will be more readily appreciated if the actual conditions 
of the infant nation be kept in mind: the war for independence not 
yet over and apt to flame up again at any moment; the machinery of 
civil government hardly yet in motion; the population, scarcely num¬ 
bering 50,000, scattered thinly over an area two or three times as 
large as New England, without a circulating medium, and possessed 
of scarcely a dollar of surplus capital available for such an enterprise. 

The fathers of the enterprise were Dr. Branch T. Archer, James 
Collinsworth, T. J. Green, T. F. McKinney, A. C. Horton, A. C. 
Allen, and Mosely Baker, names prominent in the history of the 
revolution. They seem to have had visions of a sort of Credit Mobilier 
that should have control of the banking and transportation facilities 
of the country, and should have unlimited means for speculating in 
lands and all kinds of personal property. The charter granted by 
Congress and approved by President Houston, December 16, 1836, 
conferred upon the company “the right of connecting the waters of 
the Rio Grande and the Sabine, by means of internal navigation and 
railroads, from and to such particular points of connection as may 
be agreed upon and selected by said company, with a privilege also 
of constructing such branches, either by canals or railroads, to connect 
with the main line above named, as may be agreed upon and deter¬ 
mined by said company.” That is, the company was to construct a 
complete system of river, canal, and rail transportation facilities, 
including a main line across the entire country from east to west 

4 Galveston News, September 1, 1879. For an account of the trouble produced 
by the spread of Texas or tick fever among Northern cattle, see an article by 
the present writer in the Review of Reviews, January, 1904. 


552 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


and as many branches as the demands of the community or the inter¬ 
ests of the company might dictate. In addition to this the company 
was to have “banking privileges/’ which, in those days, invariably 
meant the power to issue its notes to circulate as money, as well as 
to carry on the ordinary business of discount and deposit. It was 
to establish one central bank, after the fashion of the Second Bank 
of the United States, whose career was then closing, with as many 
branch banks as “they may think the necessities of the community 
require,” provided that not more than two branches should be estab¬ 
lished without the consent of some future congress. No limit was 
fixed to the amount of circulating notes the company might issue 
and the only provision for their security or redemption was that all 
the assets of the company were made liable for the payment of the 
notes and that they should bear interest at the rate of ten per cent 
from the date of protest for non-payment until they were fully paid. 
In addition to all this it was declared that the company “shall be 
in law capable of holding, purchasing, and conveying any estate, 
real, or personal, or mixed, for the use of the said corporation.” 

The capital of the company was fixed at $5,000,000, of which 
$1,000,000 was to be paid in before the banking operations could 
begin. If, in the opinion of the company, the commercial wants 
of the country or the welfare of the corporation should demand it, 
the capital stock could be increased to $10,000,000, provided a bonus 
of $100,000 was paid into the national treasury. The amount of the 
discounts the company was allowed to make at any one time was 
limited to three times the amount of the capital stock, and the rate of 
discount should not exceed ten per cent. 

In return for all these privileges the company was to pay to the 
State a bonus of $25,000 and two and one-half per cent of the net 
profits arising from the railroads and canals to be constructed and 
one per cent of the dividends arising from the banking department, 
and in addition was to transport free of cost the troops and munitions 
of war belonging to the State. The charter was to remain in force 
forty-nine years and might be renewed for a like period upon the pay¬ 
ment of $500,000 bonus and five per cent of the net profits from 
the “works.” The company was given the right of eminent domain 
and was allowed to take possession of the public lands one-half mile 
on each side of the right of way and pay for them at the minimum 
price per acre. Finally provision was made for an annual inspection 
by a commissioner to be appointed by the President. 

The charter of the company seems to have aroused very little 
opposition in its passage through Congress, but when its terms be¬ 
came known to the people during the political campaign of 1837, a 
storm of opposition and panic swept over the country. It was de¬ 
nounced as a monopoly, a hydra-headed monster, and the destroyer 
of the liberties of the people. One speaker on the floor of the Senate 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


553 


said: “I would rather have seen twenty thousand Mexicans invade 
us, than to have seen that charter pass into a law; for we could, with 
little difficulty perhaps, whip and annihilate them, but we can never 
get rid of this devouring monster. ,, The Telegraph and Texas 
Register, July 29, 1837, said editorially: 

Our condition is now such that should we continue blind to our duty the 
fairest portions of our republic will gradually pass from our possession, and 
this vast institution, like a devouring monster, will commence the tremendous 
work of ruin; swallowing league after league, as planter after planter becomes 
entangled in its mighty toils; and at length county after county recedes into its 
capacious maw, until finally liberty takes flight from what was once Texas— 
the land hallowed by the sacred blood of a thousand martyred heroes. 

Among others who vigorously attacked the project was Dr. Anson 
Jones, who distributed a circular on the subject over Brazoria county 
and was elected to the Senate in 1837 on a platform of opposition 
to the company. As a result of these attacks and the hard times fol¬ 
lowing the panic of 1837, the stock of the concern was never sold 
and the whole scheme fell to the ground. 

Between the collapse of this company and the beginning of actual 
railway construction in 1851, a number of companies were chartered 
and attempts were made to raise funds and begin the work of con¬ 
struction. And it would seem that the actual work of construction 
was begun on what is now the Galveston, Harrisburg and San 
Antonio Railroad as early as 1840. The road, then known as the 
Harrisburg and Brazos Railroad, had not been incorporated, but 
Andrew Briscoe, the promoter, let a contract for 3,000 ties and 
advertised in March to hire sixty slaves to begin work. In its issue 
of May 6, 1840, the Morning Star, a newspaper published at Houston, 
says: “A large number of laborers are engaged at present in throwing 
up the track and preparing it for rails at an early season, and a greater 
number will soon be employed.” The following year the road was 
incorporated as the Harrisburg Railroad and Trading Company, but 
active operations were soon discontinued, and were not resumed again 
until 1851. 


2. Construction Prior to the Civil War 

I. Buffalo Bayou, Brazos and Colorado Railway. —The first rail¬ 
road actually constructed in the State of Texas was the Buffalo Bayou, 
Brazos, and Colorado, or what was commonly called the Harrisburg 
Railroad. It is now a part of the Galveston, Harrisburg and San 
Antonio Railroad and forms a link in the Southern Pacific line con¬ 
necting Galveston and New Orleans with San Francisco. As stated 
above, an attempt was made to build this road in 1840, but it failed 
to secure the necessary capital on account of the unsettled condition 
of the country and the danger of another Mexican invasion. In 1847, 


554 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


General Sidney Sherman became interested in the enterprise and 
purchased all the unsold town lots of the town of Harrisburg, nine 
miles below Houston, at the head of navigation on Buffalo Bayou. 
He succeeded in interesting Northern capital in the enterprise, and in 
1850 a charter was granted, the incorporators being Sidney Sherman, 
Hugh McLeod, John G. Todd, John Angier, Jonathan F. Barret, 
E. A. Allen, Wm. M. Rice, W. A. Van Alstine, James H. Stevens, 
B. A. Shepherd, and W. J. Hutchings, most of them men well known 
in the business affairs of Houston and Galveston. Jonathan F. Barret 
was made president. The line was surveyed from Harrisburg west¬ 
ward in the spring of 1851, and grading began. Late in the following 
year the first rails were received along with the first locomotive, the 
“General Sherman,” and track-laying began. By August 1, 1853, 
twenty miles were complete and the event was celebrated by a bar¬ 
becue at Stafford Point. Two years later the road was completed to 
Richmond on the Brazos, a distance of thirty-two miles from Harris¬ 
burg. A cheap pile bridge, only six feet above the water at a low 
stage, was built across the river, the middle sections being removable 
on flat boats, to permit the passage of steamboats and other vessels 
that occasionally navigated the river at that time. In 1859 the road 
reached Eagle Lake, and in i860 it was completed to Alley ton, within 
two miles of the Colorado river opposite Columbus, a distance of eighty 
miles from Harrisburg. 

It was the original plan of the company to extend the road up the 
Colorado river to Austin, but as construction proceeded it was seen 
that the natural course was in the direction of San Antonio. Accord¬ 
ingly a company was chartered in 1858, under title of the Columbus, 
San Antonio and Rio Grande Railroad, to build from Columbus by 
way of Gonzales and San Antonio to the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass. 
To connect this line with the B. B. B. & C. at Alleyton, the Columbus 
Tap Railway was incorporated in i860. But the outbreak of war 
prevented any further construction on any of these lines, and Alleyton 
remained the terminus and distributing center until 1868, when the 
Tap was completed into Columbus. 

II. Galveston and Red River Railway .—The second oldest railroad 
in the State is the Houston and Texas Central, or the Galveston and 
Red River Railroad as it was at first called. In one particular it is 
older than the B. B. B. & C., for it was incorporated by an act of 
the Legislature approved March 11, 1848, almost two years before 
the charter was granted to the Harrisburg road. The original charter 
was repealed on February 14, 1852, and a new one granted, and in 
1856 the company was authorized to change its name to the Houston 
and Texas Central. 

The original plan was to build from Galveston to the Red river, 
but grading began at Houston in 1853, and the Legislature, by special 
act, approved that action instead of requiring Galveston to be made 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


555 


the southern terminus. Work seems to have gone very slowly during 
the next three years, for when the first engine was put on in January, 
1856, only two miles of line were completed. However, the road 
reached Cypress City, twenty-five miles, on July 27, 1856, and ten 
miles more were added during the next ten months, Hockley being 
reached on May 11, 1857. The road was extended to Hempstead 
during the next year, and to Millican in i860. Here construction 
ceased until 1867, and Millican, like Alleyton, became the distributing 
point for a territory two hundred miles in diameter, extending as 
far north as Dallas and Fort Worth. 

III. Washington County Railroad. —Another part of the present 
Houston and Texas Railroad was constructed during this period, as 
an independent enterprise. This was the Washington County Rail¬ 
road, chartered February 2, 1856, to build from Hempstead to Bren- 
ham, the county seat of Washington county. Work began on this 
line in 1857 and eleven miles were opened in 1858. The road was 
completed to Brenham, twenty-one miles, in i860, and that town 
remained an important terminus until after the close of the war. 

IV. Galveston , Houston and Henderson. —This was one of the 
most important roads built prior to the Civil War. It connected 
Houston, the most important inland commercial center, with Galves¬ 
ton, the seaport, and furnished an outlet for the roads that centered 
in Houston and Harrisburg. It was incorporated by act of the Legis¬ 
lature approved February 7, 1853. Construction began at Virginia 
Point, across the bay from Galveston, March 1, 1854, and proceeded 
in a leisurely fashion toward Houston, reaching that city, a distance 
of forty-two miles, late in 1858, During these years the completed 
portion of the road was operated in conjunction with a steam ferry 
that plied between Galveston and Virginia Point. In the summer of 
1859 a bridge was completed across the bay and the line from the 
bridge to Market Street, Galveston, was completed in i860, thus 
giving direct rail connection between Houston and Galveston, a dis¬ 
tance of fifty miles. 

V. Houston Tap and Brazoria Railroad. —The Houston Tap Rail¬ 
road was built by the city of Houston in 1856, from Houston to 
Pierce Junction, a distance of seven miles, to connect Houston with 
the B. B. B. & C. Ry. In 1859 it was sold for $42,000 in cash 
and $130,000 in stock to the Houston Tap and Brazoria Railroad Com¬ 
pany, which was organized under an act approved September 1, 1856, 
and was extended to Columbia on the Brazos river, fifty miles from 
Houston, by 1861. The road was built largely by the sugar and cotton 
planters along the route, who subscribed for the stock and paid their 
subscriptions by grading the road with their slaves and teams. In 
recent years this road has been consolidated with the International 
and Great Northern and now (1909) forms a part of that system. 

VI. The Texas and New Orleans Railroad. —This road was first 


556 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


chartered September i, 1856, under the name of the Sabine and Gal¬ 
veston Bay Railroad and Lumber Company, and was authorized to 
build a line from Madison in Orange county westward by way of 
Beaumont to tide water on Galveston Bay. On December 24, 1859, 
however, an act was approved changing its name to the Texas and 
New Orleans, and authorizing it to accept an act passed by the Legis¬ 
lature of Louisiana allowing it to construct a line in that State to be 
known as the “Louisiana Division” in contradistinction from the line 
in this State, which was called the “Texas Division.” Work began 
on this line at Houston in 1858, and by August, i860, it was com¬ 
pleted to Liberty, a distance of forty miles, and by January 1, 1861, 
to the Sabine river at Orange, a distance of in miles. In February, 
1861, the Texas Legislature called the attention of the Louisiana 
Legislature to the strategic importance of an early completion of the 
“Louisiana Division” of the line in case the coast should be blockaded 
by the Federal navy. 

VII. Eastern Texas Railroad. —This road seems to have evolved 
from a project to build a line from Henderson in Rusk county to 
Burkville in Newton county. It was first chartered in 1852 as the 
Henderson and Burkville Railroad, but was later allowed to begin 
on the Gulf coast, and in 1856 its name was changed to the Mexican 
Gulf and Henderson Railroad. In 1857 work began at Pine Island 
Bayou, eight miles north of Beaumont. A few miles of line were 
cleared of brush and grubbed, and then work ceased for lack of 
funds. In 1858 the Eastern Texas Railroad Company was incorpo¬ 
rated to build a line over the route mapped out by the Henderson and 
Burkville Railroad, and it was required to pay Ferguson, Alexander 
and Company, the contractors, $3,000 for the work already done. 
The new company began work some fifteen or twenty miles south 
of Beaumont and during the next two years graded thirty miles north¬ 
ward from Sabine Pass. It seems to have forfeited its charter, for 
another company was incorporated under the same name January, 
i860, to take over the grade and complete the line. During the next 
twelve months twenty-five miles were completed and equipped with 
rolling stock and thirty miles more graded, when operations were 
interrupted by the outbreak of the war. 

VIII. San Antonio and Mexican Gulf. —This road was the begin¬ 
ning of the attempt to connect San Antonio with its seaport at Port 
Lavaca, an attempt that was not successfully carried into execution 
until during the summer of 1906, when the Galveston, Harrisburg and 
San Antonio closed the gap between Cuero and Stockdale. The com¬ 
pany was incorporated by an act of the Legislature approved Septem¬ 
ber 5, 1850, but construction did not begin until 1856. In April, 1861, 
the line was opened from Port Lavaca to Victoria, a distance of 
twenty-eight miles. Victoria remained the terminus for many years. 

IX. The Indianola Railroad. —This road was prompted by the 
rivalry of the two seaports, Indianola and Port Lavaca, and was 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


557 


intended as an offset to the San Antonio and Mexican Gulf, which 
was a Port Lavaca enterprise. It was intended to extend from In- 
dianola on Matagorda Bay through Gonzales and Austin to a connec¬ 
tion with the Vicksburg and El Paso, a line projected across the north¬ 
ern portion of the State. The line was chartered January 21, 1858, and 
fifteen miles were constructed to a junction with the San Antonio and 
Mexican Gulf Railway. This road was completely destroyed by the 
tropical hurricane that overwhelmed Indianola in 1875, and has never 
been rebuilt. 

X. The Southern Pacific Railroad .—This road was the beginning 
of the present Texas and Pacific Railroad, the great east and west 
line of the northern part of the State, a full account of which is 
given later. 1 It was first chartered Febuary 16, 1852, as the Vicks¬ 
burg and El Paso Railroad, or the Texas Western, as it was fre¬ 
quently called. It was projected from a connection with the Vicks¬ 
burg, Shreveport and Texas Railroad at the State line, westward to 
El Paso. The name was changed to the Southern Pacific by an act 
approved on August 16, 1856. Work began in 1856 on a branch from 
Marshall to Caddo Lake to be used in transporting material for the 
construction of the main line. By February 10, 1858, twenty miles 
were completed, and seven and a half more were added the next year. 
It would seem that construction work continued on this line after 
the outbreak of hostilities. . . . 

XI. The Memphis, El Paso and Pacific Railroad .—The north¬ 
ern or Transcontinental branch of the Texas and Pacific also had 
its beginning during this period prior to the Civil War. It was first 
chartered in 1853, as the Memphis, El Paso and Pacific Railroad, to 
construct a line from a point opposite Fulton, Arkansas, westward 
along the southern bank of the Red river, through El Paso, to the 
Pacific Ocean. The company was organized in 1856, one million 
dollars of stock subscribed and $125,000 paid into the treasury. Con¬ 
struction began in 1857 near Texarkana, and the friends of the project 
believed they would have fifty miles in operation in ninety days. But 
all their plans were upset by the interruption of their means of com¬ 
munication with the outside world by way of the Red river. During 
some heavy freshets in the river, immense quantities of driftwood 
lodged against the great “Raft,” adding several miles to its length and 
completely cutting off communication with points below. It was then 
decided to build a branch line to Caddo Lake and secure materials 
and supplies from that source. Construction began on this branch 
line near Jefferson and five miles were completed and put in operation 
and fifty-seven miles of the main line were graded before the outbreak 
of hostilities put a stop to the work. Work was resumed in 1869 and 
one hundred miles were put in operation during 1870. 

It is believed that the preceding account covers all the railway 

1 The chapter on the building of the Texas and Pacific is omitted in these 
Readings. 


558 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


mileage completed and put in operation up to 1862, when construction 
ceased on account of the war. The period is one of “loud profession 
and little deed.” Beginning with the Texas Railroad Navigation and 
Banking Company in 1836, the Legislature had by special act incor¬ 
porated more than fifty railroad companies and authorized the con¬ 
struction of many thousands of miles of line. Many of the roads 
were projected from the State line, or the Mississippi river, or even 
the Atlantic coast on the east, across the State to the Pacific coast 
of Mexico or California on the west, while at least one road was to 
extend from the Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes or the Canadian 
frontier. The result of it all, however, was the construction of eleven 
short lines of road, which were built largely out of the lands granted 
by the State and the loans made to the roads out of the school fund. 
And most of the roads constructed were too weak to weather the 
financial storm that came as a result of the war and the period of 
reconstruction. The following table is belie'ved to be a fairly accurate 
summary of the railway construction of the period: 


Railroad 

Origin 

T erminus 

Miles 

B. B. B. & C. 



. 80 

H. & T. C. 



. 80 

Wash. County R. R.. 

. .Hempstead ... 

... Brenham . 


G. H. & H. 



. 50 

H. T. & B. 



. 50 

T. & N. 0 . 




Eastern Tex. R. R... 



. 25 

S. A. & M. G . 



. 28 

Indianola R. R. 



. 15 

Southern Pac. 



. 27 

M. El P. & Pac. 



. 5 

Total. 



. 492 


It will be noted that practically all the effective mileage centered 
in Houston, which then became and has since remained the most 
important railway center in the State. Of the five roads that did not 
reach Houston directly or indirectly, one was an effort to reach deep 
water through Sabine Pass, and two were attempts by the rival ports 
on Matagorda Bay to hold their traffic as against each other and their 
common rival, Galveston, whose importance was being greatly mag¬ 
nified as a result of her four hundred miles of railway connection. 
The two lines in Northeast Texas were feeble efforts to build a 
Pacific road along the “32d parallel.” 

The meagerness of the results obtained during the period under 
consideration was undoubtedly due to the inability of the companies 


































TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


559 


to obtain funds with which to carry on construction. There was a 
very great dearth of free capital in the country and it was with great 
difficulty that outside capital was secured. The population was small 
and scattered over a large area, and the freight tonnage was very 
light. As a result capitalists could not see any prospect of returns 
at any early date, and refused to subscribe for the stock or to buy 
the bonds of the feeble companies. To aid the companies in their 
efforts to secure funds the State granted to them sixteen sections of 
land, of 640 acres each, for every mile of line constructed, and after 
1856 made them a loan from the permanent school fund, to the 
amount of $6,000 for every mile of line constructed and opened 
for traffic. In addition cities, counties, and private individuals made 
donations to the roads in order to secure transportation facilities. 
San Antonio and Bexar county put $100,000 into the road from Port 
Lavaca to Victoria; Brazoria county donated $100,000 to the Houston 
Tap and Brazoria; and, as previously mentioned, Galveston put 
$100,000 into the bridge across the bay. 

A good idea of the financial operation of one of these roads may 
be obtained from the history of the Harrisburg line. Up to i860 it 
had raised and expended $1,209,000. Of this sum $311,700 had been 
received from the sale of its capital stock. The sum of $24,000 was 
donated by the citizens of Colorado, Fayette, Bastrop, Travis, and 
Wharton counties. Five hundred and eighty-eight thousand eight 
hundred acres of land donated by the State had been sold for $106,800, 
or about 18 cents per acre. A loan of $420,000 had been obtained from 
the school fund, and $232,000 had been secured from parties in Boston 
for which bonds were issued, and materials and supplies to the value 
of $215,000 had been purchased on the company’s notes. From these 
figures it would seem that of the $1,200,000 expended by the company, 
$550,000, or nearly one-half, had been furnished by the State or 
donated by private individuals. 


3. Effects of the War and Reconstruction 

Probably no industry suffers more severely in times of war than 
do the railways that chance to lie within the range of hostilities. Rail¬ 
way lines, on account of their strategic importance, are frequently the 
scene of the heaviest fighting and are not infrequently destroyed to 
prevent them from falling into the hands of the enemy. Most of the 
railroads of the old South were either badly crippled or entirely ruined 
by one or another of the contending armies that surged back and forth, 
with the varying fortunes of war. Fortunately for the industrial wel¬ 
fare of Texas, no hostile army succeeded in effecting an entrance to 
the State until the hopes of the Confederacy had been abandoned and 
the home guard had been disbanded. So when the Federal troops 


560 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


finally took possession of the State in 1865, there was no occasion 
for the destruction of railway property. 

In spite of this apparent immunity from the worst consequences 
of the war, the Texas railroads suffered heavily and the development 
of a system of transportation facilities was put back for ten or a 
dozen years. Two of the eleven roads in operation at the beginning 
of the war were destroyed, one certainly and possibly two roads were 
abandoned either during the war or soon after its close, while the 
roadbed and rolling stock of all the others deteriorated very greatly, 
and practically all the companies were left bankrupt. 

The two roads destroyed were the Eastern Texas Railroad and 
the San Antonio and Mexican Gulf. Most of the iron of the Eastern 
Texas Railroad was torn up by the Confederate military authorities 
and used in constructing a fort at Sabine Pass, “the rolling stock of 
the road being sent off.” “A valuable bridge across Taylor’s Bayou 
was destroyed by the United States forces; in a word, the work of 
construction was completely arrested by the war, the prospects of 
the company ruined and its property destroyed without fault on its 
part.” In 1863 the San Antonio and Mexican Gulf was destroyed 
by the Confederates under “Rebel General Magruder.” The Consti¬ 
tutional Convention of 1868 in an ordinance passed August 25, says: 
“This wanton and wicked destruction of private property and a 
great enterprise was owing to the hostility and desire of those then 
in power to harass and ruin the principal owners or stockholders on 
account of their well-known loyalty and avowed Union sentiments.” 
However, the road was rebuilt by the Federals in 1865-66, and the 
following advertisement appears in a newspaper of the time: “On 
and after August 15 [1866], the San Antonio and Mexican Gulf Rail¬ 
road Company will run daily trains (Sundays excepted) between Vic¬ 
toria and Lavaca. All freight destined for points in the interior will 
be transported at the rate of ten cents (U. S. currency) per 100 
pounds.” The road was soon in a bad way again, however, and we 
are told “that owing to the continued rains, it has become impracticable 
to run the locomotive on the road between Victoria and Lavaca. Mr. 
Thompson, the Superintendent, is preparing to run light cars by mule 
power.” In 1870 the road was sold under foreclosure by the United 
States Government to satisfy a claim of $45,000. 

The one road certainly abandoned was the Texas and New Orleans, 
which had just been completed from Houston to Orange in 1861; and 
it seems altogether probable that train service was abandoned on 
the Houston Tap and Brazoria Railroad. In a letter to General J. J. 
Reynolds, Commandant of the Fifth Military District, which em¬ 
braced Texas, Comptroller M. C. Hamilton, August 17, 1869, says: 
“It is not even known at this office whether the Texas and New 
Orleans and the Houston Tap are now organized and operating their 
roads.” But, as regards the Texas and New Orleans, Chairman Flana- 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


561 


gan of the Committee on Internal Improvements, speaks with more 
assurance. He says: “The Texas and New Orleans Road is rep¬ 
resented to be in very bad condition. The bridge over the Trinity 
river is stated to be unfit for use, and the road generally in a state 
of extreme dilapidation. Cars have ceased to pass over it.” It had 
been rebuilt to West Liberty prior to 1870 and was reopened to 
Orange in 1876. 

The other roads of the State fared but little better than the four 
just mentioned. Comptroller Hamilton said in his official report to 
the Governor: 

Most of the railway enterprises became so crippled during the rebellion that 
they ceased in any sense to be living, organized bodies. No accurate informa¬ 
tion can be given of their assets, liabilities, or capacity for business. They have 
ceased to work in the extension of their roads, and it is not known whether 
they are operating the lines already completed. 

A more detailed description of the condition of the roads may be 
gathered from the following account of the B. B. B. & C. as given by 
Mr. Flanagan’s Committee on Internal Improvements: 

In consequence of the financial derangement produced by the rebellion, and 
the wearing out of the rolling stock, machinery and roadbeds during its con¬ 
tinuance, said company became greatly embarrassed at the close of the rebel¬ 
lion, and were without means, machinery or rolling stock, and a worn-out road 
on its hands as the results of the war. 

Several other companies were worse off than this one. Six of the 
roads were indebted to the State for money loaned to them from 
the school fund prior to the outbreak of the war. In 1868, the amount 
of this indebtedness, including principal and arrears of interest, 
amounted to $2,203,000. As it seemed highly improbable that the 
companies would be able to meet their obligations to the State at any 
time in the near future, the Convention that framed the Constitution 
of 1869 ordered the Governor to take possession of the property of 
the Texas and New Orleans, the Houston Tap, and the Southern 
Pacific and proceed to sell them. None of the roads were sold in 
obedience to this ordinance, however, and by a subsequent ordinance 
the companies were allowed to retain their property upon condition 
that they make semi-annual payments of interest and one per cent 
to a sinking fund, on the basis of the amount due on May 1, 1870. 
But the Houston Tap and Brazoria was unable to meet these condi¬ 
tions and was sold by the State under foreclosure February 15, 1871. 
It was purchased by the Houston and Great Northern and consoli¬ 
dated with it by act of May 8, 1873, and now (1909) forms a part of 
the International and Great Northern Railroad system, the successor of 
the Houston and Great Northern. 

From what has now been said it is clear that the railroad com¬ 
panies that had begun the work of construction before the Civil 


562 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


War were practically ruined by it, and remained in a condition of 
utter weakness and bankruptcy throughout the period of reconstruc¬ 
tion, until Texas was readmitted to the Union in 1870. To this 
broad statement one exception must be made in favor of the Houston 
and Texas Central. While it came out of the war with its road 
‘‘broken down, dilapidated and unsafe/’ by 1868 it had been “re¬ 
newed, and made safe, its bridges renewed, stone supports put in 
place of wooden ones, new ties, new locomotives and cars cost¬ 
ing $209,000 procured, the floating debt taken up, and back 
interest to foreign and Northern bond-holders and creditors fully 
paid, and the credit of the road built up and established.” It 
extended its line from Millican to Bryan, thirty miles, in 1867, to 
Calvert, thirty miles, in 1868, to Corsicana, eighty miles, in 1871, and 
to its present terminus at Denison by January 1, 1873. In 1867 it 
acquired control over the Washington County Railroad and was 
allowed to consolidate with it, by ordinance of August 29, 1868. In 
1872 this branch was extended to Austin and the same year a branch 
was opened from Bremond to Waco, under the title of Waco and 
Northwestern. 

Most of this construction took place after 1870, and, with the 
exception of the Houston and Texas Central, it is believed that the 
statement is true that the railroads of the State remained in a bank¬ 
rupt conditions until 1870. During this period the mileage had in¬ 
creased from 492 in 1862 to 511 in 1870. 

4. Construction Since 1870 

With the close of reconstruction in Texas and the return of settled 
business and political conditions, the State entered upon an era of 
great activity in railroad construction. During the two decades from 
1870 to 1890, more than eight thousand miles of railroad were con¬ 
structed within the State, and our transportation system took on the 
shape it has since retained. In 1870, there were 500 miles of line in 
operation in the State; in 1890 there were 8,700 miles in operation. 
There were times during this period when construction was pushed 
forward with tremendous energy, as in the years 1881 and 1882 when 
nearly 2,800 miles of line, or more than 100 miles per month, were 
opened for traffic. There were other periods when, owing to hard 
times, or possibly reckless legislation, construction almost came to a 
standstill, as in the two years 1874 and 1875, when only 107 miles 
were put in operation, or the years 1883 and 1884, when 189 miles 
were opened for traffic. The small construction in the last named 
years was due mainly to the repeal of the land grant acts and the 
reduction of passenger fares from five to three cents per mile, changes 
made by the Legislature in 1882. 

Since 1890 there has been a slow but fairly steady expansion and 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


563 


rounding out of the system that had taken on its main features dur¬ 
ing the preceding twenty years. The amount of construction during 
the decade from 1890 to 1900 was quite small, being but slightly in 
excess of 1,000 miles, or an average of a little more than 100 miles 
per year, against an average of over 500 miles per year during the 
preceding decade. Several causes have been assigned for this de¬ 
crease in the rate of construction. Those who oppose the regulation 
of railways through a board of commissioners have undertaken to 
show that the decrease followed as a natural result of the commission 
campaign of 1890 and the organization of the Railroad Commission in 
1891. They point to the fact that the new mileage dropped from 316 
miles in 1888, 281 miles in 1889, and 224 miles in 1890, to 92 miles in 
1891. But the statistics published by the Railroad Commission show that 
the rate of construction quickly recovered from this temporary set¬ 
back, the new mileage for the years ending June 30, 1892, and 1893, 
being 162 miles and 272 miles respectively. 

Doubtless a far more important cause of the small amount of 
railroad building during the decade from 1890 to 1900 was the panic 
of 1893 and the long period of depression that followed it. For 
several years after the panic of 1893 the roads did not earn enough 
to keep their physical property in repair. Many of the roads went 
through receiverships and all of them came out of the hard times in 
a debilitated condition. The new mileage opened during the period 
rose from 65 miles in the year ending June 30, 1894, to 137 and 147 
miles in 1895 and 1896, and fell to 47 miles and 56 miles in 1897 and 
1898, the smallest amounts of construction in any years since 1875, 
when only 35 miles were opened. The next two years saw an 
increase to 162 miles and 165 miles respectively. 

With the complete return of prosperity in 1900, a new period of 
activity set in, resulting in the completion of more than 3,000 miles 
of line up to June 30, 1908, or an average of nearly 400 miles per 
year. The amount of construction rose to 463 miles in 1902 and 
1903, but declined in 1905 to 209 miles. It reached a maximum for 
the past twenty years during the year ending June 30, 1907, when 
517 miles were opened. The panic of October, 1907, did not prevent 
the completion of the mileage already graded, but it almost completely 
put a stop to all new enterprises where grading had not been com¬ 
menced. In spite of this setback, however, the new mileage for the 
year ending June 30, 1908, amounted to 325.84. The total mileage 
in the State for that date was 12,901.40 miles, not including some 
250 miles of logging roads not classed as common carriers, and 112 
miles of interurban electric railway. The thirteen thousand mile 
mark was passed about November 1, 1908. Although this is a greater 
mileage than is possessed by any other State in the Union, the fact 
is not one of particular significance when the size of the State is 
kept in view. 


564 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


The following table gives the number of miles of railway in opera¬ 
tion in 1854, with the increase in mileage for each year. 2 


Year 

Miles in Operation 

Increase 

1854. 

. 32 

— 

1855. 

. 40 

8 

1856. 

. 7 i 

3 i 

1857. 

. 157 

86 

1858. 

. 205 

48 

1859. 

. 284 

79 

i860. 

. 307 

23 

1861. 

. 392 

85 

1862. 

. 45 i 

59 

1863. 

. 45 i 

— 

1864. 

. 451 

— 

1865. 

. 465 

14 

18 66. 

. 47 i 

6 

1867. 

. 513 

42 

1868. 

. 513 

— 

1869. 

. 583 

79 

1870. 

. 7 11 

128 

1871. 

. 865 

164 

1872. 

. 1,078 

213 

1873. 

■. i,S 78 

500 

1874. 

. 1,650 

72 

1875. 

. 1,685 

35 

1876. 

. 2,031 

346 

1877. 


179 

1878. 


228 

1879. 

. 2,591 

168 

1880. 

. 3,244 

653 

1881. 

. 4 > 9 I 3 

1,669 

1882. 


1,096 

1883. 

. 6,075 

66 

1884. 

. 6,198 

123 

1885. 

. 6,687 

489 

1886. 

. 6,925 

238 


2 The figures in this table are taken from two sources. Those prior to 1891 
were compiled by Mr. R. A. Thompson, Engineer to the State Railroad Com¬ 
mission. See his article in Transactions Texas Academy of Science, 1900, p. 78. 
The remaining figures are taken from the annual reports of the Railroad Com¬ 
mission. It will be noted that Mr. Thompson’s figures do not exactly agree with 
those given in the text for the period prior to the war and for the year 1870, 
based on the quotations from Governor Davis’s messages. The apparent de¬ 
crease after 1891, is due to the fact that the Commission eliminated several 
logging roads that Mr. Thompson had included, in the figures for 1890. Mr. 
Thompson’s figures show an increase of 92 miles for 1891. 



































TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


565 


Year Miles in Operation Increase 

1887 . 7,889 964 

1888 . 8,205 316 

1889 . 8,486 281 

1890 . 8,710 224 

1891 . 8,654.1s 3 — 

1892 . 8,816.22 162.07 

1893 . 9,088.21 271.19 

1894 . 9 ,i 53 - 6 o 65.39 

1895 . 9,290.70 137-10 

1896 . 9 , 437-71 i47-oi 

1897 . 9,484-01 46.30 

1898 . 9,540.21 56.20 

1899 . 9,702.07 161.86 

1900 . 9,867.07 165.00 

190 1 . 10,15384 286.77 

1902 . 10,616.93 463.09 

1903 . 11,080.39 46346 

1904 . 11,536-11 455-72 

1905 . 11,744.98 208.87 

1906 . 12,058.32 3 I 3-34 

1907 . 12 , 575-56 5 I 7-25 

1908 . 12,901.40 325.84 

1909 . 13,277-82 37642 

1910 4 5 6 7 . 13,819 709 

1911 . 14,326 507 

1912 . i4,94i 615 

1 9 1 3 . 15,284 343 

i 9 x 5 .. 15,569 285 

1916. 15,656 20 

19 x 7 . 1 5,739 83 

1918 . 15,917 x 78 

1919 . 15,922 5 

1920 . 16,050 128 

1921 . 16,120 70 

1922 . 16,092 s — 

1923 . 15,861 s — 

1924 . 15,852' — 

1925 . 15,955 103 

1926 . 16,071 116 


3 A decrease of 55.85 miles. 

4 The figures since 1910 are from the Texas Almanac, 1928. 

5 A decrease of 28 miles. 

6 A decrease of 231 miles. 

7 A decrease of 9 miles. 









































566 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


III. Public Aid to Railway Construction 

Probably no people have ever been more liberal than the people 
of Texas have been in their donations, public and private, to aid 
in the construction of railways. The people early realized that the 
great interior region of the State, without railroads, was relatively 
worthless and that it would remain so unless it could be supplied with 
transportation facilities. As a result, we find them willing and even 
anxious to grant the most liberal concession to railway promoters, 
and when they saw that liberal concessions alone would not secure 
the roads, we find them contributing generously of whatever resources 
they had at hand, whether lands, labor, money, or materials of con¬ 
struction. And it was but natural that the people, in their reckless 
generosity, should in many cases become the victims of selfish and 
designing individuals and corporations, who wished to speculate in 
the public lands and grow rich at the expense of others. To these 
fraudulent schemes, together with the fact that the railroads seemed 
to the people of that period to repay their generosity with exorbitant 
charges and ruinous discriminations, may be traced most of the hostility 
that at times has made itself manifest in jury box and legislative hall. 
It was a perfectly natural reaction resulting from the disappointment 
of the extravagant expectations of those who had contributed. Every 
railway enterprise was expected to make the desert blossom as the 
rose, and when the rose seemed slow in unfolding its petals the 
contributing public became bitter and blamed it all on those who were 
managing the railways. It was the same reaction that manifested 
itself in the Northwest as the “Granger Movement,” and has mani¬ 
fested itself wherever similar conditions have prevailed. 

One of the most usual forms of aid to railway building comes 
in the shape of donations from private individuals. The business men 
of the towns raise bonuses in money and grant lands for stations and 
shops, while the people along the route are expected to donate the 
right of way across their lands. This form of aid was commonly 
practiced in all parts of the country and is still much in vogue in 
Texas and other parts of the Southwest. It is impossible to esti¬ 
mate the amount of the aid in this form the railroads of Texas have 
received, but it certainly formed a considerable fraction of the original 
cost of construction. 

The object of the present discussion, however, is to give an 
account of the aid granted by public authority as distinguished from 
donations made by private individuals or commercial bodies. The 
most important form of public aid given to the railways in Texas 
was undoubtedly the grants of land that were made from the public 
domain. Other forms of public aid were: (i) aid by counties and 
cities; (2) loans from the permanent school fund; and (3) grants of 
money or bonds by the State government. These forms will be consid- 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


567 


ered in the order named before an account is given of the grants of 
public land. 


i. Aid by Counties and Cities 

The first railway companies chartered in Texas were granted very 
liberal charters, many of them including the right to issue notes to 
circulate as money. No public aid was extended to them, however, 
but, on the contrary, in the case of the Texas Railroad, Navigation 
and Banking Company, the promoters were required to pay a bonus 
to the State for their privileges and to pay for the right of way across 
the public lands. After a dozen or more companies were granted 
liberal concessions but had forfeited their charters one after another 
without being able to raise funds enough to begin the work of con¬ 
struction, the statesmen of that period began to realize that the popu¬ 
lation was too sparse and free capital too scarce to bring about an 
early development of railway facilities. They, therefore, did just 
what was being done in many other States of the Union; they pro¬ 
vided for the sale of the public credit in the shape of county and city 
bonds in order to secure funds for railway construction. 

The first act providing for the use of county and city bonds for 
railway construction was the act chartering the San Antonio and 
Mexican Gulf Railroad, passed September 5, 1850. It allowed any 
county or incorporated town along the proposed route upon a vote 
of two-thirds of the taxpayers to subscribe to the capital stock of the 
company to an amount not exceeding $50,000. City or county bonds 
were to be issued to pay for the railway stock subscribed for and a 
special tax was to be voted to pay interest on the bonds and create 
a sinking fund. Any dividends received on the railway stock should 
be applied to the sinking fund. Under this act the City of San 
Antonio and Bexar county, in which San Antonio is located, each 
voted $50,000 of bonds. The road was built from Lavaca to Victoria, 
twenty-eight miles, so the subsidy amounted to $3,571 per mile. As 
the road was not built to San Antonio, the city refused to pay the 
interest on the bonds, but President Jones brought suit and the bonds 
were held to be valid and the city was forced to pay. 

Several other roads, incorporated during the next few years, were 
given power to receive subsidies from cities and counties, but no 
subsidies were granted. In 1869, a great impetus was given to this 
form of public aid, as a result of the fact that grants of public lands, 
which had been mainly relied upon by the railways, were forbidden 
by the Constitution adopted in that year. In 1871, a general law was 
passed allowing any county, city or town to donate or subscribe bonds 
to aid in railway construction. The following is an incomplete list of 
the cities and counties that voted bonds to railroads under the terms 
of this act: 


568 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Cities 

Date of Issue City Railroad Amount 

April 30, 1873_Tyler.Houston & Great Northern $50,000 

Feb. 12, 1874.Sherman.Texas & Pacific. 84,000 

April 24, 1874... .Dallas.Texas & Pacific. 100,000 

June 6, 1876.Waxahachie .. .Houston & Texas Central. 63,000 

Counties 

Date of Issue County Railroad Amount 

.Bexar .Galveston, Harrisburg & 

San Antonio. . 

.Brazoria.Houston Tap & Brazos.. .$100,000 

[875.Galveston.Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe 500,000 

1872 .Smith.Houston & Great Northern 200,000 

1873 .Anderson.Houston & Great Northern 150,000 

From these incomplete figures it seems that the cities of the State, 
including the earlier grant by San Antonio, issued bonds to the amount 
of $347,000, and the counties, including Bexar county’s early grant, 
to the amount of more than $1,000,000. 

This form of aid was condemned by the Democratic party and 
when it came into power again, in 1874, an act was passed repeal¬ 
ing the law of 1871, under which these bonds were issued. The 
next year, when the present Constitution of the State was drafted, 
a clause was inserted which prohibits the Legislature from authoriz¬ 
ing any “county, city, or town ... to lend its credit or to grant public 
money ... to any individual, association, or corporation . . . or to 
become a stockholder in such association or corporation.” This pro¬ 
vision practically put an end to this form of public aid, though it 
seems that there were a few attempts made to evade the plain im¬ 
port of this clause. Thus, in 1879, the town of Brenham issued 
twelve thousand dollars of negotiable bonds and used the proceeds 
in the purchase of right of way and depot grounds for the Santa Fe 
Railway. These bonds were subsequently held to be void, but the 
decision did not affect the railway’s title to the lands. The town of 
Cleburne also granted lands for right of way and depot to the Santa 
Fe Railway, and the Supreme Court of Texas held the scrip issued 
to make the last payment on the lands to be void. 

2. Loans from the Permanent School Fund 

In 1850, Texas surrendered her claim to the portion of New 
Mexico east of the Rio Grande and accepted her present boundaries. 
In return she received from the Federal Government $10,000,000 in 
United States bonds. Two million dollars of this amount was set 





















TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


569 


apart as a permanent school fund, the interest being distributed among 
the counties and used in the support of the schools. As the bonds 
were maturing and being paid off, the money began to accumulate 
in the State Treasury and the schools suffered the loss of the inter¬ 
est. It was, therefore, desirable to find some method of investing 
the money, which would be safe and would yield a return to the 
school fund. At the same time the railways were greatly in need of 
ready cash. They had lands and labor in many cases, but they 
found it extremely difficult to raise enough money to pay for ties 
and rails and rolling stock. It was, therefore, proposed that the 
State lend the school fund to the railway companies, and take a first 
lien on the roads as security. 

Accordingly an act was passed in 1856, providing that when a 
railroad company could show a continuous section of twenty-five miles 
or more completed and ready for the rolling stock and another like 
section graded and ready for the rails and ties, it should be entitled 
to receive money from the public school fund to the amount of $6,000 
for every mile actually completed. In return the company was re¬ 
quired to execute its bond to the State for the amount of money 
received, and to pay thereon eight per cent per annum, six per cent 
as interest to the State and two per cent to create a sinking fund 
for the retirement of the bonds at maturity. The act created a board 
of school commissioners composed of the Governor, the Comptroller, 
and the Attorney General, and provided for the appointment of a 
competent engineer to inspect the roads and see that they were con¬ 
structed in a “good and substantial manner.” 

Under the terms of this act loans were made from the school 
fund to six companies, the loans being made either in United States 
bonds or in money. No loans were made after the Civil War. The 
following table shows the amount loaned to each company: 


Houston and Texas Central. $450,000 

Buffalo Bayou, Brazos and Colorado. 420,000 

Texas and New Orleans. 430,000 

Houston Tap and Brazoria. 300,000 

Southern Pacific (Texas and Pacific) . 150,000 

Washington County Railroad (H. & T. C.) .. 66,000 


Total .$1,816,000 


Opinions have differed widely as to the wisdom and success of 
this policy of lending the school fund to the railways. One writer 
says: 

It proved a miserable failure. While doubtless advantageous to the rail¬ 
roads, it was very disadvantageous for the State. Doubtless it contained some 
elements of merit, but the enormous loss that accrued to the school fund is 










570 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

eloquent testimony to the fact that not all finely conceived theories work out 
in practice. 

On the other hand Governor Hogg thought well enough of the 
system to advocate a law providing for the investment of the school 
fund in the first mortgage bonds of railways. In his speech at Wills 
Point, April 22, 1892, in opening his campaign for renomination as 
Governor, he said that the State loaned $1,816,000 and had received 
up to that date $3,102,000 as principal and interest, while other 
amounts were still due. He said: 

With the wreck of war, involving the desolation of homes, waste of fortunes 
and repudiation of public and private obligations, there were few or no secur¬ 
ities that survived except these very railroad bonds in which the school fund 
had been invested. There was less loss to the school fund from that investment 
than from any other securities, either public or private, known to the authori¬ 
ties of the State. 


3. Aid by Grants of State Bonds 

During the period of active railway construction in this country it 
was a common practice for the States, and even the Federal Govern¬ 
ment, to lend their credit to the railway companies by donating public 
bonds, or by guaranteeing the interest and principal of bonds issued 
by the companies themselves. Sometimes the companies were required 
to repay the sums advanced, as was the case in the Federal loans to 
the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific, while in other cases the 
amounts advanced were donations pure and simple. Especially reck¬ 
less was the financiering of this kind in the Southern States during 
the period of reconstruction, and most of these States came out of 
those stressful times with crushing loads of debt that made repudi¬ 
ation justifiable, if it may ever be justified. Texas, more by chance 
than otherwise, escaped from the most irksome burdens that were 
saddled on the other States that joined the Confederacy. 

The first proposition for the lending of the State’s credit to 
railways occurs in the Constitution of 1866, where the Legislature 
is authorized to guarantee the bonds of railways to the amount of 
$15,000 per mile, provided the company had graded twenty-five miles. 
No act for putting this provision into practice was passed by the 
Legislature, and it was omitted from the Constitution framed and 
adopted by the Congressional Reconstructionists in 1869. 

As the Constitution of 1869 prohibited further grants of land to 
railway companies, and as about this time there was a revival of in¬ 
terest in railway construction, the Legislature for the next few years 
was deluged with applications for grants of State aid in the form of 
money or bonds. Governor E. J. Davis adopted a sane attitude on 
the subject and did what he could to stem the tide. In his message 
to the Legislature in 1870 he said: “I am led to believe that great 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


571 


caution will be necessary to avoid encumbering our State with 
weighty debt, created in furtherance of the many schemes for private 
advantage, but calling for State aid, that will be forced upon you 
in the name of internal improvements/’ He opposed all pledges of 
the State’s credit, but thought that if the Legislature was determined 
to make grants to any enterprise it should be to a road that would 
connect Austin with the roads entering the State along the north¬ 
eastern boundary. 

In spite of the Governor’s advice, two acts were passed granting 
many millions of State bonds to two railway enterprises, the one 
to secure a road along the line suggested in the Governor’s message 
and the other to secure the speedy construction of a road across the 
northern part of the State to the Pacific coast. The former act was 
passed, August 5, 1870, “to incorporate the International Railway 
Company, and to provide for the aid of the State of Texas in con¬ 
structing the same.” It provided for the construction of a road from 
a point on the Red River, opposite the town of Fulton, Arkansas, 
to Laredo, on the Rio Grande. It then continues: 

In order to secure and promote the rapid construction of said railway, and 
thereby afford cheap and necessary facilities for immigration into the State 
. . . the State of Texas consents, binds, and obligates itself to donate, and 
hereby grants to said company the bonds of the State of Texas to the extent 
and amount of ten thousand dollars per mile, for each mile of said railroad 
constructed under this charter. 

The bonds were to run for thirty years and bear interest at the 
rate of eight per cent. They were to be signed by the Governor and 
Treasurer and countersigned and registered by the Comptroller, and 
then issued when proper proof should be made that twenty miles had 
been completed in a “thorough and substantial manner.” 

The company organized under this charter and on November 25, 
1871, notified the Governor that fifty-two miles had been completed 
and thirty-three more graded, and made formal application for the 
bonds due on the first fifty miles. The bonds to the amount of 
$500,000 were prepared and signed by the Governor and the Treasurer 
and were then presented to the Comptroller, A. Bledsoe, to be 
registered and countersigned by him. He refused to sign the bonds 
on the ground that the law was unconstitutional on account of the 
use of fraud in securing its enactment. The railroad company then 
instituted mandamus proceedings to compel him to sign them, but the 
Texas Supreme Court held that the proceedings could not be sus¬ 
tained and ordered the case dismissed. 

In the meantime the matter was settled in 1875 by a compromise. 
An act was passed, recognizing the State’s indebtedness to the rail¬ 
way company—now combined with the Houston and Great Northern 
Railroad Company, under the name of International and Great North- 


572 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ern Railroad Company—but offering, as a substitute for the bonds, 
twenty sections of land for every mile built or to be built under 
the act of August 5, 1870, together with an exemption from taxation 
for a period of twenty-five years. The company decided to accept 
the land and tax-exemption and the honor and credit of the State 
were saved. The company did not receive lands on the portion of 
its line between Austin and Laredo, because it failed to construct 
it within the time limited in its charter. 

The other act granting State bonds to railways was entitled “An 
act to encourage the speedy construction of a railway through the 
State of Texas to the Pacific Ocean,” and was passed over the Gov¬ 
ernor’s veto, May 24, 1871. It granted a total of $6,000,000 in eight 
per cent bonds to be divided equally between the two companies that 
were then engaged in an effort to build a Pacific railroad, the Southern 
Pacific, projected from Longview westward through Dallas, and the 
Southern Transcontinental, projected from Texarkana westward just 
south of the Red River. The two roads were to form a junction 
at some point west of the eastern boundary of Shackelford county 
and form one line from there westward. No bonds were to be issued 
until both roads were completed to the junction point. If the Consti¬ 
tution of the State should be changed so as to allow the Legislature 
to grant lands to railway companies, then any future Legislature 
should have the power at its own option to grant to the companies 
twenty-four sections of land per mile of road instead of the bonds. 
Finally it was provided that the Texas Pacific Railroad Company, 
chartered by act of Congress, March 3, 1871, should succeed to all 
the rights and privileges granted by the act to the two companies 
mentioned, should it consolidate with them, as was then contemplated. 

The passage of this measure, along with the International Railroad 
bond muddle, provoked an outburst of popular disapproval and charges 
of fraud and corruption were freely bandied about. Governor Coke 
in his second annual message to the Legislature, in 1875, says that 
the original International bond act, “by common consent and admis¬ 
sion was carried through the Twelfth Legislature by the most unblush¬ 
ing bribery. ,, As a result of this agitation an amendment to the 
Constitution was adopted, allowing the Legislature to make grants of 
land to railway companies, provided not more than twenty sections per 
mile should be so granted. To the Texas and Pacific Company, which 
had now succeeded to the rights of the other companies under the 
former act, was granted twenty sections of land per mile of road 
instead of the bonds of the State. When the present Constitution of 
the State was drafted in 1875, a provision was inserted stating that the 
“Legislature shall have no power to make any grant of public money to 
any individual, association of individuals, municipal or other corpora¬ 
tions whatsoever.” 

Thus terminated this form of State aid. Fortunately the State 


Transportation in texas 


573 


escaped without any bonded indebtedness resulting from the reckless 
attempts to lend the State’s credit, though bonds to the amount of 
twelve or fourteen millions had been voted by the Legislature. 

4. Aid by Grants of Public Lands 

Texas, it will be remembered, reserved her public lands for her 
own use when she entered the Union in 1845. All the other States, 
except the original thirteen, were carved out of the national domain 
and the unoccupied lands within their borders remained the property 
of the Federal Government. Texas is, therefore, the only one of the 
new States that has had a public land question to solve, and her his¬ 
tory in this particular is unique. It hardly need be said that her vast 
public domain has been a most valuable asset, furnishing her the 
sinews of war in times of danger, attracting immigrants to her bor¬ 
ders, supplying an inducement for the early development of her 
transportation facilities, and finally endowing handsomely her schools 
and her charities. An account of the management of these public 
lands, when properly written, will make an important chapter in the 
State’s history. No more can be attempted here than to give a very 
brief sketch of the use the State has made of her lands in aiding the 
development of transportation facilities. 

The history of the land grant policy in Texas covers a period of 
thirty years, beginning with the first grant made in 1852 and ending 
with the repeal of the land grant act of 1876, in 1882. During this 
period the railroads of the State received a total of 24,453,000 acres 
of land, or more than 38,000 square miles, an area larger than the 
State of Indiana. The distribution of this vast body of land among 
the forty-one companies entitled to it, the recording and plotting of 
the field notes, the issuing of patents, the preventing of fraudulent 
locations, and the adjustment of conflicting claims between the com¬ 
panies and the immigrants who were constantly settling upon the 
lands, involved an administrative problem without a parallel in any 
State of the Union, and equalled only by the Land Department of 
the Federal Government. 

The history of land grants in Texas divides itself into five periods, 
as follows: 

1. The first period of special land grant acts, 1852-1854. 

2. The period of the first general land grant act, 1854-1869. 

3. The period of prohibition of land grants, 1869-1873. 

4. The second period of special land grant acts, 1873-1876. 

5. The period of the second general land grant act, 1876-1882. 

The first grant of land by the State of Texas to aid in railway 
construction was made in the charter of the Henderson and Burk- 
ville Railroad, approved February 10, 1852, though prior to this time 



574 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


a few roads had been given a right of way across any unoccupied 
public lands. By the terms of this act, when the company had com¬ 
pleted five miles or more, the Comptroller could require the State 
Engineer, or a commissioner to be appointed by the Governor, to 
examine the road, and, upon this officer’s report that the road was 
satisfactory, the Comptroller was to notify the Commissioner of the 
General Land Office, who was required to issue land certificates to 
the amount of eight sections of 640 acres each for every mile of 
road completed. These certificates could be located on any vacant 
public lands within one year from the time they were issued. The 
lands so acquired were to be alienated, one-fourth within six years 
and one-fourth within each period of two years thereafter until all 
were sold. 

On February 14, 1852, a charter was granted to the Texas Central 
Railroad Company. It contained the same land grant provisions as 
the Henderson and Burkville charter with the additional provision 
that as soon as the route of the road should be designated by survey 
or otherwise, all the vacant public lands for three miles on each side 
should be reserved from settlement. As fast as the road should be 
built, this reserved area was to be surveyed into blocks fronting one 
mile on the road and extending three miles back. The alternate blocks 
were to be reserved for the State, while the company might locate 
its certificates on the remaining blocks. Similar grants were made to 
all roads chartered from this time up to the passage of the general 
land grant act in 1854. Of the nineteen grants thus made, only two 
resulted in the construction of the required mileage so as to secure 
the lands. 

On January 30, 1854, the principles evolved during the period 
of special grants were enacted into a general law, entitled “An act 
to encourage the construction of railroads in Texas by donations of 
lands. In brief, it provided that whenever a company had completed 
a section of twenty-five miles of road in a manner acceptable to a 
competent engineer, to be appointed by the Governor to make an 
inspection, it should be entitled to receive sixteen sections of land 
of 640 acres each. The land was to be surveyed by the company, 
at its own expense, in double the amount it was entitled to receive, 
the alternate sections so surveyed to remain the property of the State. 
To secure lands for mileage constructed after the completion of the 
first section, the company was required to complete at least twenty- 
five miles in every period of two years. The lands were to be alien¬ 
ated by the companies, as in the case of the Henderson and Burk¬ 
ville road. The act was to continue ten years. 

With all the seeming liberality on the part of the State, construc¬ 
tion proceeded very slowly and the people became more anxious for 
railway facilities. So, in 1856, we find the Legislature extending 
further aid by loans from the school fund. And still construction 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


575 


lagged. Accordingly, an act was passed allowing the roads to re¬ 
ceive a portion of their land—four sections to the mile—as soon as 
ten miles should be graded and made ready for the ties, and finally 
ten sections were to be advanced as soon as five miles were so graded. 

The act was to have expired in 1864, but it was twice extended, 
which would have kept it alive until 1876, if it had not been rendered 
null by the prohibition of land grants inserted in the Constitution of 
1869. This closed the period of the first general land grant act. Dur¬ 
ing the period forty new companies were chartered, but only nine 
completed sufficient mileage to secure the benefits of the act. Some 
five hundred miles of weak and disconnected railway seems to have 
been the total result of all the generosity and fostering care bestowed 
upon the railroads by the people of Texas and their legislative agents. 

The Congressional Reconstructionists, who were in charge of the 
State government after 1867, adopted a rigorous attitude toward the 
companies indebted to the school fund and ordered several of them 
sold under the sheriff’s hammer to satisfy the State’s claims. They 
also looked upon the use that was being made of the public domain 
as profligate, and, as a result, they wrote into their Constitution 
adopted in 1869, a prohibition of land grants to railways. Yet the 
Legislature that met the next year has always been regarded as the 
most corrupt and profligate legislative body that has ever assembled 
in Austin. This Twelfth Legislature was the one that granted State 
bonds to the International Railway and to the Southern Pacific and 
the Southern Transcontinental railway companies, as already ex¬ 
plained. To escape the burdens of these acts the people proceeded 
to amend the Constitution so as to allow the Legislature to continue 
the settled land grant policy. During this period of prohibition thirty- 
one companies were chartered and nine carried on the work of con¬ 
struction. Of the nine,, one received lands by virtue of prior legis¬ 
lation and seven by virtue of subsequent legislation. 

With the inauguration of Governor Coke in 1874, the Demo¬ 
cratic party returned to power and the land grant policy was resumed. 
In his first message Coke said: 

The policy of Texas has been, since 1850, to encourage the construction of 
railroads by granting land subsidies. The wisdom of the policy has been vin¬ 
dicated by the results. ... I recommend the utmost liberality of dealing with 
them. They are a necessity for Texas. The wealth of the vast interior of 
Texas can only be reached through them. 

Pie urged that grants of lands be reserved for roads proposing 
to build into the unsettled portions of the State, lest the public domain 
should become exhausted and these areas be left without means of 
communication. But this suggestion seems not to have been acted on. 

During the next three years a number of special acts were passed 
granting lands to railways, all substantially adhering to the principles 


576 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


laid down in the general law of 1854, and limiting the grants to six¬ 
teen sections to the mile, except the two compromise acts substituting 
lands for bonds in the case of the International and Texas and 
Pacific roads. These companies received twenty sections per mile. 
During this period of three years forty-two companies were char¬ 
tered, twelve new roads were constructed in part, and ten of them 
received lands by virtue of the special acts. 

Up to this time all railways were incorporated by special act of 
the Legislature and this gave rise to much lobbying and undue in¬ 
fluence by railway promoters who might be seeking special favors. 
To get rid of this evil the Constitution of 1876 provided that all rail¬ 
way charters should be issued in accordance with a general law and 
all grants of land should be made by a general law. Accordingly the 
Legislature in 1876 passed a general railroad incorporation act and 
a general land grant act. The land grant act provided that railroad 
companies when they could show a section of ten miles completed 
should receive sixteen sections to the mile of completed road. The 
land must be alienated, one-half in six years and the other half in 
twelve years, under penalty of forfeiture. 

Under these acts sixty-seven companies were chartered prior to 
the repeal of the land grant act in 1882. Of this number only nineteen 
constructed their roads, and only twelve received lands. But by 1882 
the State had made provision for granting about four times as much 
vacant land as it had other than the one-half set aside by the Con¬ 
stitution as school land, and had actually issued certificates for nearly 
eight million acres more than it possessed. Under these circumstances, 
an act was passed, April 22, 1882, repealing all laws granting lands 
to persons for the “construction of railroads, canals and ditches.” 

With the passage of this act the policy of extending public aid to 
railway construction came to an end. 

The following table shows the forty-one companies that received 
lands and the number of acres received by each company: 

Railroads 

Buffalo, Bayou, Brazos and Colorado 

Houston and Texas Central. 

San Antonio and Mexican Gulf .... 

Houston Tap and Brazoria. 

Washington County Railroad. 

Texas and New Orleans . 

Eastern Texas Railroad. 

Memphis, El Paso and Pacific. 

Southern Pacific . 

Texas and Pacific . 

Indianola Railroad . 

Galveston, Houston and Henderson 


Acres 

887,021 

4,764,160 

264,898 

500,480 

236,160 

1,226,880 

291,840 

258,399 

562.560 
5,167,360 

171,520 

610.560 














TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


577 


Railroads Acres 

Columbus Tap . 49,280 

International and Great Northern. 3,331,200 

Houston and Great Northern. 2,307,200 

Waco and Northwestern . 481,480 

Galveston, Harrisburg and San Antonio. 1,432,960 

Gulf, Western Texas and Pacific. 299,520 

Dallas and Wichita.411,520 

Tyler Tap. 458,240 

Western Narrow Gauge . 428,160 

Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe. 3,259,520 

East Line and Red River. 1,164,160 

Galveston, Brazos and Colorado Narrow Gauge. 157,440 

Corpus Christi, San Diego and Rio Grande Narrow Gauge.. 855,680 

Henderson and Overton. 143,360 

Houston East and West Texas. 787,840 

Longview and Sabine Valley. 108,800 

Denison and Southeastern .. 214,400 

Georgetown Railroad . 98,560 

Central and Montgomery. 263,040 

Denison and Pacific. 426,240 

Waxahachie Tap. 113,920 

Texas Central . 1,471,360 

Missouri, Kansas and Texas Extension. 272,000 

Texas and St. Louis . 942,080 

Texas Trunk . 107,520 

Texas Mexican . 556,800 

Chicago, Texas and Mexican Central . 225,280 

Austin and Northwestern . 382,720 

Rusk Transportation. 76,800 


Total number of acres patented was 35,768,718, but this includes a 
large amount of land that has since been recovered from the com¬ 
panies. 

5. Results of Public Aid 

It is very difficult to arrive at any definite conclusions in regard 
to the results of the State’s policy of extending public aid to railways. 
That it hastened railway building in the State may safely be assumed. 
There were no roads in the State when the policy was first adopted, 
and about six thousand miles when it was abandoned. How much 
earlier the railway system was developed than it would have been 
developed without State aid is a matter of mere conjecture. But the 
population was so sparse in i860 and 1870 that it would have been 
very difficult for a road to build and maintain itself without outside 
help. As shown elsewhere, nearly one-half of the money expended 






























578 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


by the Buffalo Bayou, Brazos and Colorado prior to the Civil War, 
came from the sale of its lands and from the loans it received from 
the school fund. Even in 1880, the population of the State showed 
an average of fewer than six persons to the square mile, and the 
largest cities, separated by long stretches of sparsely settled territory, 
contained a population of not more than twenty or twenty-five thou¬ 
sand. 

Under such conditions it is reasonably certain that without State 
aid railway construction would have gone forward much more slowly 
than it did during the period from 1870 to 1882. It is probable that 
the great decrease in the mileage constructed, from 2,765 miles dur¬ 
ing 1880 and 1881 to 189 miles in 1883 and 1884, was due in large 
measure to the repeal of the land grant act on April 22, 1882. The 
largest mileage constructed in any one year under the stimulus of the 
land grants was 1,669 i n 1881. The largest mileage since the repeal 
of the land grant act was 964 miles in 1887. 

There has been much difference of opinion in regard to the value 
of the lands in helping the railway companies construct their lines. 
It is frequently said that the State practically built the railways. On 
the other hand it is pointed out that there were so many land cer¬ 
tificates issued to soldiers and settlers, to canal and ditch companies 
and to turnpike and bridge companies, that they were bought and sold 
on the market at a very low price, often at only twenty or thirty 
cents an acre. In addition the companies had to pay the expense of 
locating, surveying, and plotting, not only their own lands, but an 
equal amount for the State, and then pay into the treasury ten dollars 
in fees for every section patented. The cost of locating and survey¬ 
ing was so heavy that, it is said, it was not uncommon for the survey¬ 
ors to demand one-half of the land for locating the other half. Up to 
June, 1877, the Texas and Pacific Railway Company had expended 
$233,000 in surveying its own lands and the State’s alternate sec¬ 
tions, had paid into the treasury $80,400, had surveyed and section- 
ized for the State more than five million acres of school land at an 
estimated saving to the State of $120,000, but had been able to mar¬ 
ket less than one thousand acres of the lands granted to it. The 
fact that the companies were required by law to alienate their lands 
within limited periods of time forced them into the market in com¬ 
petition with each other and prevented them from holding the lands 
until a fair price could be obtained. 

From the standpoint of the State the land grant policy was prob¬ 
ably not an unwise one, though many abuses crept into the system 
during its continuance. In the first place it undoubtedly aided the 
State in securing a fairly efficient system of transportation facilities 
at a date much earlier than if no public aid had been extended. In 
the second place it greatly aided in the settlement of the State and 
the development of its natural resources. The stream of immigra- 


TRANSPORTATION IN TEXAS 


579 


tion always flows along the lines of least resistance, which, in a region 
without water communication, means along the railway lines. The 
railways, too, having lands to sell along their routes, and realizing that 
a heavy traffic is impossible without a dense population, became im¬ 
migration agents for the State and helped greatly to swell its numbers. 
The entire urban population of the State is clustered in the cities 
and towns, which are strung along the railway lines like beads on 
a string. This is true, not because the railways built to the cities, 
for there were few cities before the coming of the railways, but be¬ 
cause the cities built to the railways. With the increase of population 
came a more than corresponding increase in the tax rolls and the fiscal 
resources of the State, while the increased demand for lands has added 
millions to the value of the lands set apart for the schools. 

Another supposed benefit received by the State was the survey¬ 
ing and sectionizing of the public lands, which was done by the rail¬ 
way companies without expense to the State. This, however, seems 
to have been of very doubtful benefit, or even actually harmful, for 
many of the surveys were so poorly made that they have been a con¬ 
stant source of uncertainty and litigation. Under a statute passed in 
1887 more than nine million acres had been resurveyed prior to 1890 
at a cost to the settlers of over $200,000, while since 1900 a large 
number of resurveys have been necessary to quiet “the trouble and 
turmoil” resulting from the poor work done by the railway surveyors 
of an earlier period. 

Another abuse of the system, that practically amounted to fraud 
on the part of the railway companies, was their failure or refusal 
to alienate their lands as was required by law. The temptation to 
hold the lands was very great, for every year added to their value; 
and while they were held they could be used as security for loans 
obtained in the financial centers of Europe, where land security was 
highly esteemed. The sales of land, therefore, were often mere color¬ 
able transfers to officers of the company, intended to comply with the 
letter, but not the spirit of the law. A favorite scheme was the organ¬ 
ization of a land company to take over the lands and manage them in 
the interest of the company or its creditors. Such a company was 
the New York and Texas Land Company, Limited, of Austin, which 
took over the entire land grant of the International and Great North¬ 
ern Railway, amounting to 3,331,200* acres, to manage it in the inter¬ 
est of the holders of the old company’s second mortgage bonds. As 
the law requiring the alienation of the lands did not apply to these 
land syndicates, they could hold the lands indefinitely and retard the 
settlement of the State. To eradicate this evil, the Legislature in 
1893 passed a law declaring that the “unrestricted ownership of lands 
in this State by private corporations is a perpetuity, and is prohibited,” 
and requiring the alienation of the lands within a period of fifteen 
years. 


580 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


In spite of abuses on the part of the railways and of reckless gen¬ 
erosity on the part of the people and the Legislatures, Texas may 
fairly be congratulated on the results of the public aid she ex¬ 
tended to railway construction. Few of the cities and counties have 
been very seriously burdened on account of the bonds they voted to 
the railroads. While the school fund suffered the loss of interest on 
the loans to the railways for a number of years, it came out with 
comparatively small ultimate losses. Although millions of State 
bonds were voted by the Legislature, none were actually issued, and 
the name of the State was not tarnished by the repudiation and bank¬ 
ruptcy that overwhelmed so many of the States of the West and 
South, as a result of their attempts to aid works of internal improve¬ 
ment. And, finally, the State has transferred to the tillers of the 
soil the ownership of a splendid public domain, and in the process of 
doing so has founded her charities and colleges, magnificently endowed 
her common schools, and secured the early construction of a trans¬ 
portation system which exceeds in mileage that of any other State 
of the Union. 


CHAPTER XLIII 


SOME ASPECTS OF THE HISTORY OF WEST AND 
NORTHWEST TEXAS SINCE 1845 

By R. C. Crane 

[This selection is from The Southwesterly Historical Quarterly, XXVI, 
30-43. See: Rupert N. Richardson, “Some Details of the Southern Overland 
Mail,” in the same Quarterly, XXIX, 1-18; Lucy A. Erath, “Memoirs of Major 
George Bernard Erath,” in the same Quarterly, XXVI, 207-233, 255-279, XXVII, 
27-51, 140-163; Carl C. Rister, The Southwestern Frontier, 1865-1881 (A. H. 
Clark Company, Cleveland, 1928), particularly the last three chapters—Prob¬ 
lems of Frontier Life, Influence of the Cattle Industry on the Frontier, and 
Building of Railways, pages 241-307.] 

While West and Northwest Texas were settled and developed 
after Texas had ceased to be a republic and had become a state of 
the Union, yet that settlement and development came under condi¬ 
tions and policies inherited from the republic. 

The fixed and almost uniform policy of the people of our country 
from the earliest colonial adjustments with the aborigines had been 
one of agreement by treaty regarding boundaries and mutual rights 
and relations. President Sam Houston in his first term had followed 
that policy for Texas with the result that little trouble was expe¬ 
rienced with the Indians in the young republic during that administra¬ 
tion; but President Lamar, following him, fixed on Texas for all 
time the policy of warfare on the Indian and expulsion from Texas, 
or extermination. 

For nearly forty years West and Northwest Texas felt the ill 
effects of that policy; and the consequent animosity always existing 
between settlers and Indians in Texas had a marked effect in delay¬ 
ing the settlement and development of those regions of the state 
specially. 

Nearly every other part of Texas was settled under a system of 
land laws under which the first colonists were granted their homes 
at the rate of a league to the family and a third of a league to the 
single person. Several million additional acres were granted for mil¬ 
itary and other services. Later, settlers were granted smaller tracts 
conditioned on occupancy. 

But the settlement and development of that part of the state in 
question had its commencement after Texas became a state, and un- 

581 


582 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


der conditions materially different; and its history (including the Pan¬ 
handle) is as distinct, and its growth and development especially dur¬ 
ing the past forty years just as phenomenal as had been that of any 
other part of the state. By coming into the Union, Texas had a right 
to look to the general government and its army for protection against 
the Indian and his depredations. And yet that the history of this 
region is peculiar to itself, calling for somewhat different treatment; 
and the fact that the agencies and the army of the United States 
have had a largely controlling effect in the exploration and the pro¬ 
tection of its frontiers, and hence its settlement and development have 
been, it appears to me, too little realized by those of us interested in 
the history of Texas. The history of the region is little touched on 
as a thing worth while, though it contains in area at least one-half 
of the state, and supports a population several times as great as 
Texas contained when it came into the Union. Its settlers bought 
their lands and their homes from the school funds of Texas and from 
the various railroads and their assignees; lands that had been granted 
by Texas at the rate of sixteen sections to the mile, in aid of the 
construction of railroads, nearly all of which were in other parts of 
the state. 

The policy of thus granting public lands in aid of railroad con¬ 
struction commenced in Texas in 1854 and closed with the exhaustion 
of the public lands in 1882 when the Southern Pacific and the Texas 
& Pacific Railways were being connected with a Pacific coast line at 
El Paso. More railroads were needed to settle and develop the 
country; but railroads needed people and traffic in the region before 
they could afford to build, and therefore a slow waiting process com¬ 
menced about 1882 for West and Northwest Texas, and continued 
for several years. 

But going back, the discovery of gold in California had its bearing 
on these parts of Texas. For it was by reason of gold in California, 
and the consequent need of finding and making roads for the Argo¬ 
nauts and for military purposes due to the great westward expansion 
of our nation following the annexation of Texas and its access of 
territory following the Mexican war, that the discovery was made 
that West and Northwest Texas covered a vast region well fitted 
for white settlers to occupy. 

The annexation of Texas brought on the Mexican war; and gold 
being discovered in California immediately after its occupation after 
peace, brought a flood of immigrants and gold seekers trooping over 
mountains and plains who must be provided with roads to the new 
Golconda, and furnished protection while en route. Routes for these 
roads had to be discovered by exploring hitherto unknown regions, 
and trails and roads had to be made so that they could be traveled. 

The years 1849 an d 1850 were busy years for the engineers of 
the army in exploring unknown West and Northwest Texas for roads, 


ASPECTS OF WEST TEXAS HISTORY 


583 


from San Antonio and from Red River to El Paso, there to connect 
with roads to California. At least two men who rose to distinction 
during the war between the states—General Joseph E. Johnston and 
General R. B. Marcy, father-in-law and chief of staff to General 
Geo. B. McClellan—were engaged in this work, General Johnston 
from San Antonio and General Marcy from Red River. 

In the nature of things these regions being occupied or infested 
by hostile Indians, the exploration of the country and its resources 
greatly depended on the efforts put forth by the agencies of the gen¬ 
eral government; and the discovery of many of the mineral resources 
of Texas has been the result of those efforts and explorations. But 
with the rush of gold-seekers to California the need became urgent for 
roads that could be traveled the year round, free from the dangers 
and difficulties incident to the trails further north across mountains 
and plains. This gave to West and Northwest Texas the chance to 
be discovered. 

In the territory of the United States as it existed prior to the 
annexation of Texas and the Mexican War, there were sixty-three 
military posts in the whole country. In the year 1851 after the gain 
of territory greater than was contained in the organized states and 
territories in the whole country before the two events mentioned, 
there were one hundred and nine military posts, forty-six of which 
were in the newly acquired territory, the great bulk of which was 
unsettled and infested with Indians more or less hostile. Nineteen 
of these posts were in Texas—mostly in West and Northwest Texas. 
The army had been increased from something over 8,000 men to 
less than 13,000, an increase not nearly in proportion to the increased 
needs and demands on it, incident to the vast increase in territory to 
be covered and protected. Repeatedly did the generals of the army 
call attention of Congress to the insufficiency in the numbers of the 
men of the army to afford efficient frontier protection, but usually 
with little notable effect. 

When Texas was admitted to the Union, the extreme western 
posts were located at Fort Jessup, in Louisiana; Forts Towson, 
Washita and Gibson, Indian Territory; Forts Scott and Leaven¬ 
worth, in Kansas; Forts Atkinson and Snelling, in Minnesota, and 
Fort Wilkins, on Lake Superior. In 1849 there was a chain of 
United States Army forts across Texas, running from Fort Duncan 
on the Rio Grande, by Fort Marvin Scott at Fredericksburg, Fort 
Croghan in Burnet County, Fort Gates in Coryell County, Fort 
Graham in Hill County on the Brazos, and Fort Worth in Tarrant 
County. 

Several of these had just been established, but as a result of a 
survey of “Western Texas” made in the fall of 1849 by Lieutenant 
Whiting, between that time and 1853, the imaginary line between 
Texas belonging to the white man, and Texas given over to the 


584 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Indian, was moved westward, and Forts Marvin Scott, Croghan, 
Gates and Worth were abandoned, and Forts Belknap, in Young 
County, and McKavett, in Menard County, Mason, in the county of 
the same name, Chadbourne, now in Coke County, Phantom Hill, in 
Jones County, and Stockton, in Pecos County, were established, in 
addition to several other posts on the Rio Grande. 

According to the United States Quartermaster General of the 
army in 1851 there was not then in all of Texas, New Mexico, Califor¬ 
nia or Oregon, a steamboat line, or a railroad, or even a turnpike road, 
and all transportation over nearly the whole region west of the Mis¬ 
sissippi River was by the slow moving wagon train, drawn by oxen 
or mules. When supplies had to be gotten to the new frontier forts, 
in Texas and elsewhere, the increase in the cost of transportation was 
so great as to alarm the officers of the army; and thereupon this cost 
problem was investigated. 

Fort Leavenworth had steamboat navigation on the Missouri River, 
and had been a frontier fort before the Mexican war. Indianola was 
then the leading port on the Texas coast. The army conducted a 
series of experiments from Indianola and from Fort Leavenworth to 
El Paso and the forts of New Mexico, by regular army wagon trains 
and by contract, and ascertained that the cost was about the same 
either way, and found that the cost of transporting army supplies be¬ 
tween these points amounted to about $22 per hundred pounds. A 
large part of this cost, where done by contract, was incident to fur¬ 
nishing military escort and protection through the Indian infested 
country traversed, which was necessary. 

Again, roads had to be found and made by the men of the army, 
for this army transport traffic, between posts, and for all other needed 
purposes. High army officials recommended that all of the cavalry 
be stationed in Texas and New Mexico, and repeatedly called atten¬ 
tion to urgent need for more cavalry for the frontiers of Texas. 
Finally just before the war between the states another cavalry regi¬ 
ment was added by Congress and stationed in Texas, with Robert 
E. Lee as colonel; W. J. Hardee, lieutenant colonel, and Earl Van 
Dorn and George H. Thomas as majors. 

But this moving back of the imaginary frontier line by the estab¬ 
lishment of the outer line of forts mentioned did not take place until 
Captain R. B. Marcy had in 1849 made his pathfinding expedition 
from Fort Smith, Arkansas, westward through what is now Okla¬ 
homa, and the Panhandle of Texas to Santa Fe, New Mexico, and, 
returning, had logged the Marcy trail from El Paso, Texas, to 
Preston, on Red River near the present city of Denison, along the 
general route later followed by the construction of the Texas & Pacific 
Railroad. Such a route and such a trail up to that time were thought 
to be impossible; and only through the aid of the noted Delaware 
Indian guide, Black Beaver, who knew the wild, uninhabited (ex- 


ASPECTS OF WEST TEXAS HISTORY 


585 


cept by roving bands of Indians) country traversed, were they made 
possible. 

In his outward journey, in crossing the plains, Captain Marcy kept 
to the south of the Canadian River, and from his account evidently 
passed through Hemphill, Roberts, Hutchinson, Carson, Potter, and 
Oldham Counties. His description of his first view and impression 
of the plains becomes of interest in view of the subsequent develop¬ 
ment of that region. Under date of June 14, 1849, m l°g book, 
Captain Marcy says: “Leaving camp early this morning, we travelled 
two miles on our course when we encountered a spur of the plain 
running too far east for us to pass around; and finding a very easy as¬ 
cent to the summit, I took the road over the plain. When we were upon 
the high tableland, a view presented itself as boundless as the ocean. 
Not a tree, shrub or any other object, either animate or inanimate,^ 
relieved the dreary monotony of the prospect—it was vast, illimitable 
expanse of desert prairie—the dreaded Llano Estacado, or, in other 
words, the great Sahara of North America. It is a region almost 
as vast and trackless as the ocean—a land where no man, either sav¬ 
age or civilized, permanently abides; it spreads forth into a treeless, 
desolate waste of uninhabited solitude, which always has been and 
must continue uninhabited forever; even the savages dare not venture 
to cross it except at two or three places where they know water can 
be found.” 

Captain Marcy could not then foresee that in 1919 the counties 
which he was traversing would produce nearly 2,500,000 bushels of 
wheat, and in 1920 would contain nearly 30,000 people. On this first 
day on the plains, he “made a long drive of twenty-eight miles on a 
perfectly hard and smooth road, with no ill effects ,, to his animals. 

When Captain Marcy had finished logging his trail from El Paso 
to Preston, on Red River, he gave unqualified endorsement to its 
practical utility, and expressed his belief that a large part of the 
country was capable of great agricultural development. He professed 
familiarity with the mountain routes to California, and claimed that 
his route was better in every respect than the mountain trails across 
the continent. 

Straightway after the logging of this new trail emigrant travel 
to the Pacific coast set in over it, and Forts Belknap, Cooper, Phan¬ 
tom Hill, and Chadbourne were established on or near it for the 
protection from Indians of this travel and of the expanding waves of 
settlers from other portions of the state in search of new homes. 

In January and in September, 1850, the Legislature of Texas 
passed strong resolutions calling on the United States government 
to place adequate armed forces on the borders of Texas to protect 
the lives and property of its citizens from marauding Indians, asserting 
that the state had a right to expect this under the terms of annex¬ 
ation. 


586 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


In 1851 several tribes of Indians, numbering in all something like 
1,200, were settled in peaceful agricultural pursuits on the Brazos, in 
Young County. These included the Caddos, Keechies, Wacos, and 
Delawares. In that year Colonel Cooper, later adjutant of the army, 
and Colonel Hardee made visits to these Indians and left descriptions 
of the trips and of the situation and conditions of the Indians. 

In 1854, for the first time, Texas agreed through its Legislature 
to the settlement of her resident Indians on reservations, and in that 
year passed a law providing for the survey by the United States of 
twelve leagues of land, giving jurisdiction over the same to the gen¬ 
eral government, with authority to establish and maintain Indian 
agencies, military posts, etc. And thereupon Captain Marcy, who was 
probably one of the government’s most dependable explorers and path¬ 
finders, was sent to Texas to make selection of the sites for the 
* reservations thus provided for. This was in the summer and fall 
of 1854. W. B. Parker was an attache of this expedition, going 
along for the purpose of collecting all manner of specimens to be found 
in the country traversed, and he wrote upon his return a detailed 
account of the trip and its experiences, giving much information about 
the country traveled over, and its condition, topography, etc. 

At least sixteen of the present counties of Texas, mainly in North¬ 
west Texas, were explored by Captain Marcy on this trip, including 
Cooke, Montague, Clay, Archer, Baylor, Knox, King, Dickens, 
Crosby, Haskell, Jones, Shackelford, Throckmorton, Stephens, Young 
and Jack. 

The expedition was fitted out at Fort Smith, and the military 
escort was furnished from Fort Arbuckle. It crossed into Texas at 
Preston, and traveled westward. It passed through Gainesville, then 
on the extreme western skirts of the settlements in that part of Texas. 
Gainesville then contained, according to Parker, five or six log cabins, 
and had then just been rendered somewhat famous in the annals of 
storms by a most terrific tornado which had occurred a few months 
before. Parker gives many interesting details of the storm in and 
about Gainesville. He says that in an hour’s time after leaving Gaines¬ 
ville, Captain Marcy and his expedition passed the last house on his 
route; and all west of him was then a trackless, uninhabited waste! 
And not another white person was seen while traversing all of the 
region covered by the counties named, until the party reached the 
little frontier fort at Belknap, several months later. The party 
caught great messes of catfish out of an unnamed creek near the foot 
of the plains, and thereupon Captain Marcy named it Catfish creek. 
Other instances of the same character are mentioned. 

But he was on the lookout for suitable locations for the Indian 
reservations he was sent out to find, and finding none to suit him 
better, he had surveys made in the vicinity of where the Indians were 
already settled on the Brazos, and on the Clear Fork of the Brazos 
for a branch of the Comanches. 


ASPECTS OF WEST TEXAS HISTORY 


587 


The act of the Legislature providing for these reservations called 
for them to be located within twenty miles of the chain of forts main¬ 
tained by the United States government. Captain Marcy, in conjunc¬ 
tion with Major Neighbors, the Indian agent, had met and conferred 
with the Indians, and had secured their consent to occupy the reser¬ 
vations thus made for them. 

But Captain Marcy, in reporting his previous pathfinding expedi¬ 
tion, had given the route then laid out by him his unqualified endorse¬ 
ment as affording the very best route for the construction of a railroad 
to the Pacific coast, following which and its further survey westward 
the Gadsden Purchase had been made to secure from Mexico needed 
land over which to construct such a railroad; and, therefore, in 1854, 
when Captain Marcy was locating the Indian reservations, the con¬ 
struction of railroads through West and Northwest Texas was in the 
air, and the Legislature in providing for the Indian reservations re¬ 
tained a three hundred-foot right-of-way through them for the con¬ 
struction of a railroad, if so surveyed, charters for which had already 
been granted by Texas. 

The Texas & Pacific Railway was subsequently built through that 
region, but some thirty miles to the south of the Indian reservations. 

From 1849 onward interesting facts are laid up in the official 
reports of the government, bearing on Indian warfare in the portion 
of Texas in question; on explorations for finding roads for military 
and migration purposes, it being essential to locate along the road sites 
grass and water at convenient camping places, preferably twelve to 
twenty miles apart for the use of the numerous wagon trains passing 
through the country. Where surface water could not be had wells, 
and in some instances, artesian wells were drilled, especially in the 
region of the Pecos. The haunts of the Indians had to be hunted 
out, and additional locations of army posts had to be made occasionally. 
The growing travel to the Pacific coast must be provided for and 
protected that the newly acquired coast possessions with their gold 
fields might be developed. And thus the stock of information about 
West and Northwest Texas was continually added to. 

Naturally, without railroads, the question of transportation other¬ 
wise was a very live question to be met for its own purposes, at least 
by the general government during that period of time before the war 
between the states. In his report in December, 1853, Secretary of 
War Jefferson Davis showed that he had given study to the question, 
and then gave cogent reasons for the use of the camel for experi¬ 
mental purposes, “to test their value and adaption to our country and 
our service.” He cited their satisfactory use by Napoleon in his 
Egyptian campaign, and in other countries where somewhat the same 
conditions existed; and his recommendations were adopted and the 
camels imported and used for several years, until the war broke out 
in 1861. In 1857 Secretary Floyd commended their use in Arizona, 
and in i860 General Lee expressed his satisfaction with their use in 


588 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the rocky and mountainous regions of the Pecos, he being in command 
in Texas. 

In this year Secretary Floyd gave his hearty endorsement, as 
preferable to any other, to this southern route for the construction of 
the much needed railroad to the Pacific coast, surveys for which over 
various routes had been made. 

The reconnaissance of the route through Northwest Texas after¬ 
wards followed in general by the Texas & Pacific Railway had been 
made, and interesting and detailed information of the results thereof 
from Fort Chadbourne to the west have been left in print. 

The Indian reservations mentioned had been short lived, and the 
Indians had been removed to Indian Territory. United States Army 
records give interesting facts about the causes leading to that out¬ 
come which have been but meagerly used by writers on Texas history. 

In the fall of 1858, the then next best thing to a railroad—the 
stage coach—had been in operation across West Texas from San 
Antonio to San Diego, California, through El Paso, a distance of 
1,200 miles; and over the Marcy trail across West and Northwest 
Texas from St. Louis to San Francisco by way of El Paso, a dis¬ 
tance of 2,700 miles. This was said to be 40 per cent longer than any 
other stage line in our history and also the longest in the world. This 
line was known as the Butterfield Southern Overland Mail. At Pres¬ 
ton was the first division out of St. Louis; at Fort Chadbourne was 
the second; at El Paso the third, and thence to Tucson, Fort Yuma, 
and the sixth and last division at San Francisco. Its coaches started 
simultaneously from St. Louis and San Francisco on a twenty-five-day 
schedule, and beat the schedule by one day, and each was greeted 
by a mighty ovation. Its equipment consisted of more than one 
hundred Concord stage coaches, one thousand horses, five hundred 
mules, and seven hundred and fifty men, including one hundred and 
fifty drivers. It began as a semi-weekly but was soon promoted to 
six times a week, and from the first its operations had the effect of 
advertising and greatly aiding in the settlement of the country through 
which it passed, notably Fort Belknap and Young County, which it 
put on something of a boom. 

It was promoted by John Butterfield and was successfully operated 
until the war between the states came on, when it was transferred to 
a shorter route, where it took its chances with the snows. 

The same event that put a stop to the Butterfield stage line also 
put a stop to the growing possibilities of the early settlement and 
development of West and Northwest Texas for twenty years to come. 
When the war came on, owing to the exigencies of military necessity 
in i the South, small attention could be paid to the Indian, and for 
years he roamed almost at will over Texas frontiers; and practically 
all intercourse with the Pacific coast stopped short. 

Many men who made names for themselves on both sides of the 


ASPECTS OF WEST TEXAS HISTORY 


589 


controversy were in the United States Army in the portion of Texas 
in question, when the war came on, as colonels, lieutenant colonels, 
majors, captains and lieutenants. Among the number who afterwards 
wore the gray were Generals R. E. Lee, Fitzhugh Lee, E. Kirby Smith, 
John B. Hood, Earl Van Dome, and W. J. Hardee; while George 
H. Thomas, George Stoneman, W. M. Graham, S. D. Sturgis, S. P. 
Heintzelman, and William B. Hazen wore the blue, all of whom were 
on the frontiers of Texas at or just before the clash of arms came, 
all helping to make possible and desirable the settlement and develop¬ 
ment of West and Northwest Texas to the full limit of their allotted 
duties. 

During the period of the war there is little to be said with assur¬ 
ance with reference to border conditions. 

When the soldiers came back to the Texas frontier, Phantom Hill 
and Camp Cooper were not reoccupied. Forts Belknap and Chad- 
bourne were for a time reoccupied, but were abandoned, and Forts 
Richardson, Griffin and Concho were built and occupied in their 
places, during the brief time that General W. S. Hancock was in com¬ 
mand in Texas. Other posts were occupied. As late as 1874 maps 
of Texas assigned large sections of the plains country to the Comanche 
Indians as hunting grounds under the treaty of 1865. 

Until 1876 all of that vast region lying north of a line extended 
westward from the southeast corner of Nolan County, and west of 
a line extended northward from the same place, comprised successively 
parts of Bexar and Young land districts, and was in that year carved 
by the Legislature into fifty-four counties. There was also enough 
territory in Tom Green County at that time to make twelve additional 
counties, which was done from time to time afterwards. 

When General E. O. C. Ord was in command of United States 
troops in Texas, in his report for 1877-1878 he summed up the situ¬ 
ation as it then existed as follows: “The people of Northern and 
Western Texas were during the Civil War and for some years after¬ 
wards, raided upon and their settlements forced back from fifty to 
one hundred miles, and hundreds of people were killed by the 
Comanches, Apaches, and other Indians from the Wichita country, the 
staked plains and occasionally from Mexico; but during the years 
1874 and 1875 active campaigns against these bands within our limits 
resulted in their capture or retreat to the mountains of Mexico, bor¬ 
dering on the Rio Grande . . . and it is from these mountains that 
they have kept up a regular system of depredations upon stock raisers 
on the frontier counties of Texas, so that about in proportion as the 
demand for land increases for the use of the rapidly increasing flocks 
and herds, the dangers attending the stock farmer in those counties 
have grown and become known.” 

He says that “the murders and robberies committed by the In¬ 
dians have so long furnished the staple news of Western Texas papers 


590 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


that people of the country have almost come to look upon this state 
of affairs as the normal condition of things as for a long period of 
time it has been in Sonora, Chihuahua and parts of Coahuila, and 
to regard it as part of the Texas ranchman’s duty to put up with the 
regular full moon raid and its accompanying horrors.” He then 
calls attention to the fact that according to Father Saddelmayer this 
character of warfare had been going on in parts of Mexico for nearly 
two hundred years. 

General Ord further says in the same report: “The Texans dur¬ 
ing the war and reconstruction have submitted to the murdering of 
the frontier inhabitants and the plundering of the border settlements 
because they did not see any other way of relief; but now . . . they 
feel that something should be done to make life and property secure 
on the border.” 

About 19,000 miles were traveled that year, according to General 
Ord, by the soldiers of the nation in scouts and expeditions after 
Indians in the portion of Texas under discussion; while in the follow¬ 
ing year 40,000 miles were covered in one hundred and twenty differ¬ 
ent expeditions from thirteen regular and thirteen subposts and scout¬ 
ing camps on the borders by two full regiments of cavalry, four regi¬ 
ments of infantry and two companies of artillery. 

In the Pecos country, where no railroad had then penetrated, the 
Indians were still troublesome. The mail routes and the settlements 
had to be protected by the soldiers; and the Indians had to be forced 
out of that region and kept out by the soldiers. And General Ord 
says that: “the intended result has been practically accomplished. All 
Indians penetrating the country have been so hotly pressed by the 
troops as to prevent their doing much damage.” 

From the plains region occasional raids by Indians continued 
until about this time when General Mackenzie fought a last decisive 
engagement with a large band of them near what is now Claude in 
Armstrong County and demolished the Indian forces and sent them 
scurrying back to their haunts never again to act as a hindering force 
against the settlement and development of Northwest Texas. 

In 1874 under Governor Coke the Texas Ranger force was re¬ 
organized and about four hundred men placed in the field, and about 
this number of men were kept in service until the Indians were finally 
disposed of. They were unafraid and followed many an Indian trail, 
and had many a brush with Indians, and are entitled to great credit 
for the part they had in the pacification of West and Northwest 
Texas from the border ruffian, the outlaw, and the Indian. But his¬ 
tory will not bear out the accuracy of the statement “that the Texas 
Rangers drove the Indians out of Texas,” as recently claimed in a 
book by an ex-Texas Ranger. 

Since 1880 there have been no Indians in Texas to fight, and 
therefore her people have been busy with the battles of peace. 


ASPECTS OF WEST TEXAS HISTORY 


591 


In 1879 for the first time the Legislature felt called on to pass 
land laws affecting West and Northwest Texas, when the pioneering 
cattlemen began “trekking” in great numbers to the frontiers with 
their herds. In 1882 the Texas & Pacific and the Southern Pacific 
railways completed their tracks at El Paso to a connection with the 
long delayed railroad line to the Pacific coast. Since that time about 
fifteen hundred miles of other lines of track have been built, making 
possible the addition to Texas of the Empire of West and Northwest 
Texas, dotted with dozens of cities ranging in population up to 80,000 
souls, and peopled with probably the largest proportion of Anglo- 
Saxon strain to be found in our whole country. 

Of the growth and development of the last forty years I have not 
planned to deal at this time. I have not sought to be exhaustive 
but rather suggestive only of a line of thought and investigation, and 
of sources of light thereon in the study of Texas history which 
appear to me have been too little used. 

The battles of peace as fought by the people of the region in 
question in conquering the elements, and in their fight against lack of 
understanding of their difficulties and conditions—so different from 
many other localities—have been at times quite as strenuous as any 
Indian warfare ever staged. And if her people have measurably 
succeeded it may be because history has repeated itself, and that the 
instances in other sections of our common country where God-fearing, 
sturdy men and women with the blood of pioneers in their veins have 
gone into the wilderness and made forest and plains to blossom as the 
rose, have been somewhat followed and duplicated on the plains, 
valleys and hills of West and Northwest Texas. 


CHAPTER XLIV 


THE TEXAS RANGERS 

By Walter P. Webb 

[From an article published by Professor Webb in the Dallas News.] 

Just what is the Texas Ranger? The question can be answered 
best by finding out what he has been, discovering his origin, tracing 
his development, and examining his duties. The exact date of the 
origin of the Rangers is lost in the obscurity of early Texas history. 
Stephen F. Austin mentioned them in his letters of 1823, more than a 
century ago; Bancroft ascribed their beginning to 1838, but in this 
he was clearly wrong for the Rangers had not only come into exist¬ 
ence, but had acquired a legal status before that time. When Texas 
revolted in 1835, a general council met, and, as a part of its work, 
authorized the first Ranger force. This organization was to consist 
of three companies of twenty-five men each, one to range east of the 
Trinity, one between the Trinity and the Brazos, and the third be¬ 
tween the Brazos and the Colorado. The men were to serve solely 
as protection against the Indians, the remuneration being $1.25 per 
day. Thus was the Texas Ranger force created in the midst of 
revolution, and from that day to this it has existed almost constantly 
in some form, though under varying titles. The creation by the 
council of the Ranger force was a formal recognition of a pressing 
social need, and the legalizing of a mode of warfare already estab¬ 
lished; the long life of the organization implies that the need for 
it continues. It would be well at this point to examine the circum¬ 
stances out of which such a need arose. 

In order to make the situation clear, it will be necessary to ask 
the reader to use freely his power of imagination. Picture two great 
rivers, five hundred miles apart, flowing parallel to each other from 
the far northwest to the southeast across a tilted plain seven hundred 
or more miles in extent, and emptying their waters finally into the 
great Mississippi and the Mexican Gulf. Between these two great 
rivers—the Red on the north, the Rio Grande on the south—lies 
Texas, cut by scores of other streams of less magnitude, all of which 
flow in the same general direction. To the south and east this plain 
is well watered and heavily timbered; but to the northwest, as the 
elevation becomes higher, the timbered region gives way gradually 
to a grassy, treeless plain, with average altitude of about one mile 

592 


THE TEXAS RANGERS 


593 


above the sea. Texas consists, then, of two well-defined areas, dif¬ 
fering one from the other in climate and in flora and fauna. The 
lowlands and the east may be not improperly designated the timber 
belt; the higher, treeless area of the northwest is known as the prairie 
region. 

In the early days the prairie region extended further east than at 
present, due to the fact that the Indians frequently burned the prairies 
and destroyed all undergrowth. With the coming of the white man 
the prairie fires ceased, and much of the land that was formerly 
barren of trees is now overgrown with dense thickets of scrubby 
oak. Such is the mighty stage upon which the drama of Texas 
history has been enacted. 

Who have been the actors in this drama, and what role have 
the Texas Rangers played upon the far-extended stage? The cur¬ 
tain rises to reveal the Indians growing their corn, chasing the buffalo 
and stalking the deer. While they were all savage, from the white 
man’s point of view, they differed widely in degrees of savagery, 
and they differed largely according to the land which they occupied. 
The eastern tribes—those of the well-watered timber land—were more 
or less sedentary, being fishermen, farmers and hunters. The western 
tribes—those of the rolling plains—were roving, nomadic warriors, 
migrating with the movements of the buffalo herds. Here in Texas 
existed two distinct cultures among the Indians. The timber tribes 
comprised the Caddo, Attacapan and Karankawan confederacies; the 
prairie men consisted of Apaches and Comanches, and the two cul¬ 
tures were in constant conflict. 

History has no record of the length of the conflict, but the Spanish 
conquerors discovered it when they explored the New World. Un¬ 
intentionally, they lent aid to the wild tribes of the prairie by re¬ 
leasing some of their war horses in Mexico. These multiplied and 
spread. They swarmed up from the south and covered the Texas 
plains with immense herds, waxing fat on the succulent mesquite 
grass and furnishing mounts for the Comanches. These Indians soon 
became the best horsemen of the Western world and gained a ter¬ 
rible advantage over their adversaries. 

The Spaniards, meantime, were also coming north, the sword in 
one hand and the Bible in the other, making conquests and converts 
as best they could, and reducing the Indians to mission life wherever 
they were able. With the more docile timber tribes they met a certain 
measure of success, but as they emerged from the timbered regions 
of Eastern Texas on to the prairies they encountered the Comanches 
at San Antonio and the Apaches at San Saba, and never did the 
Spaniards fail more signally than in their attempts to reduce these 
wild horsemen of the plains to submission. By 1800 Spain’s efforts 
to control the Indians in Texas were at an end. In short, her fron¬ 
tier policy had failed. 


594 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Perhaps Spain’s failure on the frontiers of Texas was but a 
symptom of that impending disaster which, within a score of years, 
was to sweep from her imperial but palsied hand all her colonial 
possessions in America. Texas with all her problems fell to Mex¬ 
ico. But if Spain could not cope with the prairie Indians, what hope 
had Mexico, a country which has apparently not yet found the key 
to self-control? The story is told—and on good authority—that when 
Texas was a province of Mexico the Comanches frequently came into 
San Antonio, the center of the Mexican population, and compelled 
the Mexican citizens and soldiers to hold their horses while they 
paraded the streets and celebrated the occasion! 

The first settlers from the United States were introduced into 
Texas by Stephen F. Austin at the beginning of 1822. Why did the 
Mexican Government permit an alien race to come in? There are 
several reasons well known to the historian, and it is said that one 
of them was the desire to place some strong arm between the timorous 
Mexicans, like those of San Antonio, and the wild Indians. The 
Comanche’s horse might become too hard to hold! Quien sabef 
However this may be, an examination of the land grants made to 
Americans will show that their holdings tended to form a tier lying 
roughly between the timber belt and the prairie region. In short, 
the Americans from the United States were to serve as a buffer 
between the wild tribes and the interior settlements, and on them was 
to devolve the task of conquest at which both Spain and Mexico had 
failed. 

Once more the door of Texas was open, the Americans pushed in 
with that mighty surge which carried the Anglo-American civilization 
from the Atlantic to the Pacific during the first half of the last cen¬ 
tury. Mexico, becoming alarmed, undertook to close the door, but 
it was too late. The Texans—for such the immigrants had become— 
not only stood off the Indians, but turned on the Mexicans and 
wrested from them Texas independence in 1836, just fifteen years 
after they had entered the State. This done, however, they found 
themselves in a most precarious situation. They were caught, as it 
were, between the jaws of a great vise. One frontier—the Indian— 
extended along the edge of the great prairie from the Rio Grande 
to the Red River, a distance of five hundred miles; the other—the 
Mexican—stretched from some point on the Rio Grande to the mouth 
of that stream, an approximate distance of three hundred miles. The 
actual southern boundary of the settlements at the time of the Re¬ 
public really corresponded within the Nueces. 

It should also be observed that for every mile that the Indian 
frontier was pushed back, the Mexican line was lengthened by just 
so much until the two attained a combined length of more than one 
thousand miles! Surely no State was ever more desperately situ¬ 
ated than the young Republic. Sometimes she was at peace with 


THE TEXAS RANGERS 


595 


one enemy and sometimes with the other; but again she fought them 
both. War was the rule, the commonplace of daily life, and death 
was the price of defeat, for the savage enemies of Texas knew no 
mercy. 

What sort of fighting force would Texas devise to meet this 
unhappy situation? Had the State been populous and wealthy as she 
is today, the answer would have been simple. In those days her 
population was less than that of Dallas, and her promise to pay was 
worth sixteen cents, and less, on the dollar. Hard money was a 
negligible quantity. These things made a standing army impossible. 
Whatever fighting force was provided must be small and inexpensive 
in order to be maintained at all. It must rise in time of need and 
disperse when the danger had passed. Such are the circumstances 
in the early history of Texas out of which evolved this peculiar fight¬ 
ing force. 

These early Rangers were semi-military in character, varied in 
formation and organization, ununiformed and undrilled, and irregu¬ 
lar in operations. They were in a sense, indigenous to Texas, having 
sprung from the soil made fertile by the blood of their kinsmen, and 
they soon became the frontier fighting force par excellence of the 
world. They were the forerunners of such organizations as the 
Northwest Mounted Police of Canada, the Cape police of South 
Africa and the Pennsylvania State police, though unlike any of them. 
They were the Anglo-American solution of the problem of the fron¬ 
tier. The true character of the Rangers becomes clear only in the 
light of that knowledge which comes from an acquaintanceship with 
the nature and disposition of their foes, the Mexicans on the one 
hand and the Indians on the other. From long experience with the 
Mexicans, the Texans had come to distrust every word and deed 
of the race; they doubted their honor, feared their mercy and de¬ 
spised their valor—lessons dearly learned at the Alamo, Goliad, and 
San Jacinto. From the Indians, whose position on the west has 
already been indicated, they also took hard lessons. The Comanche 
warrior was a terrible foe, courageous, cunning and cruel, an adept 
in all the practices and subterfuges of partisan warfare, and in order 
to meet him, the Ranger had to adopt his tactics. For example, the 
Comanche always came suddenly, mounted on the fleet prairie mus¬ 
tangs, which they managed with consummate skill, and which bore 
them away with the speed of the wind. Again, the Comanches never 
permitted themselves to be made captive, and to become their prisoner 
meant torture and death. Here were the ready-made rules by which 
the Rangers had to fight. They were of necessity superb horsemen, 
using their legs mostly for mounting and sticking on. They were 
sure marksmen, showing great preference for the revolving six- 
shooter. They were versed in woodcraft, and possessed an uncanny 
sense of direction, and they knew the lore of the forest as well 


596 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


as that of the plain. Colonel John S. Ford, himself a Ranger, sol¬ 
dier and newspaper man, summed up their qualities in these words: 
“The Texas Ranger can ride like a Mexican, trail like an Indian, 
shoot like a Tennesseean, and fight like a very devil.” Above ail, 
these frontiersmen were the embodiment of individualism. It was 
their outstanding trait, their chief characteristic. They were self- 
reliant and resourceful, frequently extricating themselves from diffi¬ 
culties, not by fighting but by quick thinking. Only one thing in 
warfare they had forgotten in their long struggle with a dual foe, 
and that was to surrender. They gave quarter—sometimes—but never 
asked and never expected it. 

Their leaders were natural leaders, men who possessed in a high 
degree the qualities they admired in others and found essential to 
themselves. A few of these men were John C. Hays, Ben McCul¬ 
loch, John S. Ford and the two Rosses. The ranks were filled with 
those courageous ones who loved action and adventure better than 
ease and gain. All early Texans were more or less frontiersmen 
who had left the older states because they felt crowded, and the 
Rangers were the most courageous of these. Had not David Crockett 
met death in the Alamo soon after his arrival in Texas, he would 
most surely have become a Ranger, as did his friend and companion 
from Tennessee, Ben McCulloch. 

Though the Texas Rangers have never had a prescribed uniform, 
their dress has always been distinctive. They have worn buckskin, 
corduroy or khaki, according to time and circumstance. Fine leather 
boots, spurs and large felt hats have been a part of their costume 
from the days of the Republic until the present. Their arms have 
consisted of the best rifle that could be had, from two to four pistols, 
a lariat, and perhaps a bowie knife. They were the first to demon¬ 
strate in actual war the value of the revolving six-shooter, and after 
its invention in the ’forties, it became and has remained to this day 
their chief weapon. They have never carried sword or saber. An 
English writer explained this fact by saying that the Indian never 
engaged in close personal combat, while the Mexican was too danger¬ 
ous with the lasso. Once the United States Government equipped a 
regiment of Rangers for frontier service and prescribed sabers as 
a part of their arms. General Sam Houston, who was Governor at 
the time, caustically remarked that these would no doubt be of great 
service to the Texas Rangers, especially in a snake country! 

The origin and character of the early Rangers have been indicated 
and an effort will be made to trace their changing fortune from the 
period of the Republic until the present. In 1845 Texas joined the 
Union. The Mexican War followed immediately, during which the 
Rangers performed such valiant service as scouts and guerrilla fight¬ 
ers with the armies of Taylor and Scott that they were heralded as 
heroes throughout the nation. When the war ended, and Texas 


THE TEXAS RANGERS 


597 


found herself in the Union, the Rangers disbanded with the feeling 
that the regular army would afford Texas and her citizens whatever 
protection was needed against the Indians. The federal government 
did establish posts and maintain forts along the frontier, which she 
garrisoned with regular soldiers. These troops were either dragoons, 
usually mounted on large and clumsy horses, or infantry, but in 
neither case did they understand Comanche warfare. The Indians 
were not long in finding this out, and they soon spread terror 
throughout the borderland, whose inhabitants called long and loud for 
Rangers. One writer, commenting on the situation in 1849, said: 
“If Harney [General Harney was in charge of the Eighth Military 
Department, Texas, with headquarters at San Antonio] can have his 
own way, I can not but believe he will call in Hays, McCulloch, and 
all the frontier men, and pursue the Comanches to the heads of the 
Brazos, the Colorado, and even up under the spurs of the Rocky 
Mountains. . . . Harney can take the dragoons along with him, but 
for the light work he must have Texas Rangers. Without them, even 
he, with all his determination and go-aheadity, can effect but little.” 
Another writer declared that the infantry was of as much use against 
the Comanches as a sawmill on the ocean. 

At times the situation was so bad that the state called out the 
Rangers, trusting to the federal government for reimbursement; at 
other times the men served without pay. Congress was petitioned 
and implored, but did little. “Give us 1,000 Rangers,” said General 
Sam Houston in a speech in the United States Senate, “and we will 
be responsible for the defense of our frontier. . . . We ask no regu¬ 
lar troops; withdraw them if you please. I ask this not through any 
unkindness to them, but because they have not the efficiency for 
frontier service.” The government did not withdraw the regulars, 
but did supplement them with companies of Rangers. Just prior 
to the Civil War, two notable battles occurred. In one of them, 
Cynthia Ann Parker was recaptured and Chief Peta Nocona killed. 

Speaking of this period between the Mexican War and Civil 
War, Gen. W. H. King says: 

Many lives were lost, many persons wounded unto death or made cripples 
for life, many carried into a horrible captivity, much property destroyed, and 
thousands of horses, mules and cattle driven off by the robbers; but still the 
border kept moving onward and onward, and still the people kept closing upon 
it, while between these moving and movable frontiers and the outlying wilder¬ 
ness a small but bold and active band of Rangers kept a thin but determined 
line of defense. 

This westward moving line was halted at the opening of the 
Civil War. At that time it extended along a line roughly drawn from 
Wichita Falls to Laredo, passing through the counties of Young, 
Stephens, Brown and McCulloch. Fort Belknap, on the Clear Fork 
of the Brazos in Young County, was headquarters for all northwest 


598 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


operations. The Indians were awed somewhat by the clash of arms 
between the North and the South, and they kept, for the most part, 
far out on the western prairies. 

Following the war came that miserable period of “Reconstruc¬ 
tion,” during which the real Texans, those who had held back the 
Indians and Mexicans, and fought valiantly for their conception of 
right in the late war, were disfranchised and made helpless in favor 
of the carpetbag legime. The Indians returned with their scalping 
knives, the carpetbaggers came for their spoils, and bold and desper¬ 
ate characters sprang up on every hand. Lawlessness and disorder 
were truly rampant in those post-war days. In 1874 the government 
was returned to white men, to the real Texans, but the conditions 
were indeed serious. The Indians remained bitter on the frontier, 
but there were worse enemies within the settlements. A great “crime 
wave” was on; murder was a daily occurrence, owing frequently to 
deadly feuds which had grown up and spread their sinister influence 
over entire counties. In many localities sheriffs feared to arrest 
criminals, witnesses dared not testify, juries were intimidated, and 
judges found it dangerous to render a decision. 

Once more the Rangers were reorganized, six companies of sev¬ 
enty-five men each. But an important change was made in their 
status and duties. They were to protect the frontier and fight In¬ 
dians as before; but in addition, they were given the power of peace 
officers. On the northern border they fought Lone Wolf, Little Bull 
and other Comanche warriors; on the southwest they guarded the 
Texas side of the Rio Grande against Cortina and his band of 
cattle thieves; in the interior they pursued and killed Sam Bass, broke 
up the Sutton-Taylor feud and drove the road agents under cover. 
When not more actively engaged, they guarded prisoners, protected 
courts and dispersed lynching parties. The Rangers were busy men 
in those days! In their double capacity of soldiers and peace officers, 
they presented a novel experiment in government, and one which did 
not escape criticism. In fact, all the criticism that has ever been 
brought against Texas Rangers has been brought against them in their 
capacity as peace officers. Be that as it may, during the ten years 
following this reorganization, the Rangers pushed the Indians to the 
very limits of Texas and at the same time rendered the interior a 
safe and decent place to live in. The success of their work was due 
largely to the high personal courage and indomitable spirit of the 
officers and men. 


CHAPTER XLV 


TYPICAL RANCH LIFE 

By Harley True Burton 

[In this selection Mr. Burton is describing the life of the J A Ranch, estab¬ 
lished by Colonel Charles Goodnight in the Palo Duro Canyon in 1876; but the 
description fits a typical large ranch. The selection is from The Southwestern 
Historical Quarterly, XXXI, 359-364, XXXII, 48-60. The history of the J A 
Ranch is treated in detail in these two volumes of The Southwestern Historical 
Quarterly. 

I. Routine of the Early Days on the J A Ranch 

A ranch “outfit” in the early days consisted of a chuck wagon 
(and later a hoodlum wagon), cook, wagon boss, horse wrangler, 
twelve or fifteen cowboys and a remuda. The chuck wagon had a 
chuck box fitted into the back of it where the end gate should go. 
The lower part of the chuck box where the pots and pans were 
carried had a bottom made out of a cowhide. It was known as the 
“coonie.” It also contained shelves and drawers in which the cook 
placed the “makings” for sour dough biscuits—soda, salt, baking 
powder, and yeast. Other shelves and drawers were filled with knives, 
forks, tin cups and plates. There were also places for keeping fresh 
beef, bacon, beans, canned corn, canned tomatoes, dried fruit, coffee 
and sugar. The front part of the wagon contained the bedding 
of the outfit and feed for the chuck wagon horses. A hoodlum 
wagon, which was added at a later date to the equipment of the out¬ 
fit, is a wagon in which the bedding of the cowboys and their per¬ 
sonal effects are carried. It also carries a large tarpaulin, the chuck, 
and feed for the hoodlum team. 

The “eats” consisted of the above mentioned foods. The cooking 
was done in the open. Almost everything was cooked in Dutch ovens 
except the dried fruits, and these were cooked in kettles or buckets 
hung on an iron bar over the fire. 

The wagon boss was the man in charge of the outfit. Everyone 
took orders from him. He decided where the round-up should be 
made each day and gave the boys instructions as to how much ter¬ 
ritory should be covered in making the daily round-up. After the 
round-up was completed he always worked inside the herd and 
directed the work. 


599 


600 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


A cowboy’s equipment consisted of a tarpaulin, two “suggins” 
(comforts), a pair of blankets, a pair of spurs, a bridle, a saddle, 
saddle blanket, a lariat, a stake rope, and a hobble rope. He was 
also furnished a mount which usually consisted of seven horses but 
sometimes of as many as ten horses. 

The remuda consisted of all the horses with the outfit. They 
were in charge of the horse wrangler, who looked after them day 
and night. He usually rounded the horses up three times a day. 
Once early in the morning, once at the wagon, and then again late in 
the afternoon. The first time they were rounded up in the morning 
was near where the round-up for the day was to be so that the boys 
could change from their round-up horses to their cutting horses. The 
second time, they were rounded up at the wagon at noon so the boys 
could change horses again. Late in the afternoon they were rounded 
up again so the boys could change horses or catch their horse to be 
staked for the night. Each time the horse wrangler rounded them 
up in a small bunch so that a rope corral could be placed around 
them and the two oldest boys could rope the horse they wanted. A 
rope corral consisted of lariat ropes tied together until they reached 
around the whole herd of horses. A horse never attempted to get 
outside this rope corral before he was roped, because he had been 
trained early by being forced to run over a rope which was stretched 
tightly about two feet above the ground. A few contacts with the 
rope gave the animal some hard falls as well as rope burns, which 
he did not readily forget. 

The boys started on the round-up for the day just as early in 
the morning as they could see. These round-ups covered about ten 
miles square of territory. The boys would all start together with 
their horses in a long run and would often travel together as far as 
ten miles. They would then split and cover a certain territory desig¬ 
nated by the wagon boss and would round the cattle up in some open 
space agreed upon beforehand. If it was a small round-up of seven 
hundred or eight hundred head, they would have the cattle rounded 
up by ten o’clock; if a large round-up of two thousand or twenty-five 
hundred head, it would usually be eleven or twelve o’clock. The boys 
would change to their cutting horses and be ready for work after 
dinner. 

Two or three men would cut out the class of cattle wanted. One 
man would hold the cattle cut out and two men would work between 
the cut and the round-up to keep them from mixing. The men who 
did the cutting changed horses after a short while (sometimes a rider 
changed as high as six times in one day) or new men would take 
their places. This was continued until they had cut out all of the 
class of cattle they were gathering. After all the cattle desired were 
cut out, the round-up was turned loose and started in the opposite 


TYPICAL RANCH LIFE 


601 


direction from the cut so that they would not mix. The cut would 
then be put in the main herd the cowboys were holding. 

In case they were gathering calves to be branded, after the cows 
and calves were cut out, they were taken to the branding pens and 
there they were separated. The calves were put in a pen to them¬ 
selves, where they were bulldogged and branded. Before there were 
any corrals, the calves were branded on the open prairie. They were 
roped and dragged to the fire where they were branded. They were 
then turned back into the round-up. 

Bulldogging was, perhaps, the hardest work connected with early 
ranch life. This was done in three ways. One way was for one 
cowboy to rope the calf around the neck. Then another cowboy 
would “flank him. ,, That is, he would walk up to the side of the 
calf and reach over his back and take hold of the calf’s flank; then 
he would pull up with his hands and push on the opposite side with 
his knees, lifting the calf off the ground bodily and throwing it on 
the ground. Another way was for a cowboy, after the calf had been 
roped around the neck, to take the calf by one ear and reach over 
its head with his other hand and catch the calf’s jaw, putting his thumb 
in the calf’s mouth just behind its teeth; then he would twist the 
calf’s neck until it was thrown. The other method is the one used 
principally today. The calf was roped by its heels and one cowboy 
would catch it up by the tail while another took hold of the rope 
close to its heels; then they would pull in opposite directions until 
the calf was thrown. In either case one man held the calf’s head 
while another would put his foot against the under hind leg of the 
calf and pushed it forward while he pulled backward the upper hind 
leg. Another man would brand the calf while still another would 
mark it. 

In the morning when the men started on the round-up the wagon 
boss always told the horse wrangler where the round-up would be. 
The horse wrangler would have the horses on hand by the time the 
round-up was completed so that the boys could change to their cut¬ 
ting horses. The cook would move the chuck wagon as near as 
he could to the round-up or rather to the nearest place where there 
was water. The day’s work was completed when the round-up had 
been worked, unless the boys were gathering cattle for the market. 
If such was the case, there was the main herd which had to be held 
at night. The boys, if holding the herd, would rest awhile after the 
round-up was finished, then eat supper, saddle their night horses, 
which were never used for any other kind of work, and stake them 
out, that is, all would who were not on the first shift. Usually three 
or four men were on guard duty at a time. Three or four shifts were 
made during the night, depending on the number of men in the 
outfit. 


602 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


The first round-up was made in the spring of the year. Stockers 
were gathered for the market. This round-up lasted several weeks. 
They always managed to get through anywhere from the first to the 
middle of May. This was necessary because by the middle of May 
it was time to start out with the wagon or wagons as the case might 
be. Sometimes there were two or three separate outfits on the J A 
Ranch and one on the F Ranch. There were from twelve to eighteen 
men with each wagon. 

It was the custom to start on the south side of the ranch and 
following the running water. This was necessary because all the 
water used came from running streams. There were no wells and 
windmills. 

As had already been stated above, the first few years, branding 
was done in the open, but in the early eighties corrals were estab¬ 
lished at Spring Creek, Plains Corral, Pleasant Creek, Turkey Creek, 
and Battle Creek. It was customary at the beginning of the branding 
season to send one cowboy to each large outfit in a hundred miles 
of the ranch to work with these outfits and the other large outfits 
would send one to the J A Ranch. These men were to look for 
cattle that had strayed away from the outfit to which they belonged. 
The branding season usually lasted until about the tenth of June. 
Then the wagons would pull into headquarters. The cowboys were 
a hard looking bunch when they pulled in. Many of them had not 
shaved or had a hair-cut during the entire time they had been with 
the wagon. Most of them were rather rugged, and it was not an 
unusual sight at all to see a cowboy with his trousers sewed together 
with a strand out of a lariat. 

Following the spring round-up all of the boys, with the ex¬ 
ception of three or four, were given a “lay off” on full time for 
three or four weeks. Three or four men were kept on duty to do 
the odd jobs that had to be done. The boys who got a lay off usually 
went to some large town and spent their wages having a good time. 
As their money gave out, they would drift back to the ranch. All 
of them managed to get back in time for the fall round-up, which 
began, as a rule, about the last of August. 

The fall round-up was very similar to that of the spring. The 
boys rounded up beef cattle for the market and branded all cattle 
that were missed in the spring round-up, including also the calves 
that were too young to brand in the spring. They tried to have all 
the cattle ready to start on the trail by frost, which was usually 
around the middle of October. When this round-up was over, some 
of the boys went to market, some were sent to winter camps and 
the rest were turned loose until the spring routine began. 

The boys who were sent to the winter camps had a very lonely 
life. Frequently they would go for months without seeing a human 
being. Occasionally they would go to headquarters and gather up 


TYPICAL RANCH LIFE 


603 


all the old magazines and newspapers they could find. The mere 
fact that a newspaper was a few months old made no difference. 
These they read and re-read at night by a light made of a pan of 
grease with a rag wick. At these winter camps there was very little 
work to do except ride the line (and later to ride the fences after 
they had been built) in bad weather and keep the cattle from drift¬ 
ing south and stacking up against the fences. In the early spring 
when the “heel flies” came, the work became heavier. The men had 
to ride the “bogs” every day and pull out poor cattle that had got 
stuck in the mud. “This was real work,” says Mr. Martin, “and 
many days of hard work were put in in this way.” About the only 
amusement the cowboys had was hunting. There was plenty of wild 
game such as quail, wild turkeys, deer, bear, loboes, coyotes, and 
fox. Mr. Martin says that in one of the camps where he stayed three 
months, the wild turkeys got so tame that they would come in large 
droves and pick up grain around the cabin where horses were fed. 
He was so lonesome that even these wild turkeys were company and 
he would not shoot them. 

Ranch life has been a popular theme for writers for generations, 
and in almost every instance ranch life has been depicted as an easy, 
carefree life. The account given of a year’s work on the J A Ranch 
is (the writer believes) typical of almost any large ranch in the early 
days. The reader will, no doubt, be impressed with the fact that 
instead of ranch life in the early days being an easy, carefree life, it 
was, in fact, a very strenuous life. However, there seems to have 
been a fascination attached to it, and anyone who worked on a ranch 
for any length of time enjoyed it. Quoting Hon. James Wadsworth, 
Jr., “No man who has ever worked on the [J A] Ranch will over¬ 
come the longing to return there.” 


II. A Year’s Work on the J A Ranch 

In the early spring when the first sprigs of grass begin to shoot 
up, the first round-up for the year is staged. This round-up is held 
in the reading room of the bunk house around the big stove. Some 
cowboy will say, “I saw some green grass today,” and another will 
speak up and say, “Yes, and I noticed the heel flies after the cattle 
today.” Then the round-up is on. The cowboys begin to swap yarns 
of thrilling experiences they have had on previous round-ups. Some¬ 
times these round-ups are very realistic; however, no one is ever hurt. 
Some time between the first and tenth of May, Mr. J. W. Kent, the 
Superintendent of the ranch, and Mr. W. C. Beverly, wagon boss, 
get together and decide when the wagon will start out on the spring 
round-up. The grass is the principal thing which determines this 
date because it is impossible to start the spring work until the grass 


604 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


will furnish good grazing for the horses; however, they usually start 
out the eleventh day of May. When this date has been definitely 
decided upon, Clinton Henry, the bookkeeper, calls up the camps and 
the farms and tells them when the wagon will start out, and at the 
same time he invites everyone connected with the ranch to the big 
dinner and baile (dance), which is an annual affair held the day and 
night before the wagon is to start out the next day. 

The cowboys all come into headquarters on a specified day, usu¬ 
ally three or four days before the round-up is to begin. On this day 
they gather up the remuda (horses) out of the canyons where they 
have been since the fall round-up. The cook comes to headquarters 
also about the same time that the cowboys do. He gets the old chuck 
wagon out of the shed where it has been since the fall work was over. 
The old wagon is thoroughly cleaned and so are the pots, pans, cups, 
knives, forks and spoons, and any new equipment needed is added 
and a supply of provisions sufficient to last for the first few days 
is placed in the wagon. The cook has everything in readiness two 
days ahead of time. After the remuda is gathered each cowboy re¬ 
turns to his winter camp and gets his things ready for the round-up. 
They return to headquarters two days before the dinner and dance. 
This time he brings with him his slicker, chaps and bedding besides 
his saddle, saddle blanket, bridle and spurs. He also brings his '‘feed” 
horses with him. The feed horses are his two favorite horses, and 
one or two “broncs” which were assigned to him in the fall of the 
year to feed during the winter months. 

The first day the cowboys are at headquarters after their return, 
each cowboy fixes his stake pins, tepee and stake rope. When these 
are fixed, he takes them and his other “belongings” and places them 
in the hoodlum wagon, which is the wagon taken along for the pur¬ 
pose. The hoodlum also carries a “fly,” a tarpaulin, chuck, feed for 
the hoodlum team, and after the round-up is started it carries a forge. 
It is ready to go about two days before time to start. 

The day before the dinner and baile is a holiday for the cowboy. 
He must get ready for the dinner and dance. He usually goes to 
town and has his “hair cut off” (hair cut) and his “whiskers drove 
in” (shave). He also makes a date with his best girl for the dinner 
and dance. 

The following day, which is “The Big Day,” the campers and 
their families, the farmers and their families, and the cowboys and 
their lady friends arrive at Headquarters in time for the big dinner, 
which is usually served about five o’clock in the afternoon. When 
all have arrived, there are about a hundred guests. This year, May 
io, 1927, there were a hundred and thirty-five guests. The long table 
in the dining room, which has been lengthened until it will accom¬ 
modate sixty people at one time, is loaded from one end to the other 
with good things to eat. The menu consists of the following articles 


TYPICAL RAN CPI LIFE 


605 


as a rule: beef prepared in every form, turkey and dressing, boiled 
ham, creamed potatoes, sweet potatoes smothered in marshmallows, 
fresh beans, celery, several kinds of pickles, stuffed and unstuffed 
olives, fruit salad, iced tea, milk, coffee, several different kinds of 
pies, and cake and ice cream . 1 

When all have been served preparations are made to start the 
all night dance, which the cowboys call “baile” or “old-fashioned 
hoedown.” It usually starts about six-thirty. It is held in the sleep¬ 
ing quarters of the cowboys in the bunk house. The music is fur¬ 
nished by some of the J A boys. Si Johnson, Bolie Mayo, and Eck 
Robertson play the violin, Clinton Henry plays the banjo and Huck 
Kent plays the guitar. Some of the pieces played are “Arkansas 
Traveler,” “Rag Time Annie,” “Over the Waves,” “Soldier’s Joe,” 
“Rye Straw,” “Measley Shame,” “Chicken Reel,” “Casey Jones,” 
“Turkey in the Straw,” “Snow Bird in the Ash Bank,” “Sugar in the 
Guard,” “Peekaboo,” “After the Ball,” and the last piece played is 
“Home Sweet Home.” . . . 

About every sixth dance is an old-fashioned square dance and 
various old-time cowboys take turn about calling for them . 2 . . . The 
dance goes on until midnight without an interruption. Then a lunch 
is served consisting of various kinds of sandwiches, fruit salad and 
coffee. The cowboys and their guests are served first and the other 
guests are served afterwards. The dance is then resumed and con¬ 
tinues until about daybreak; then “Home Sweet Home” is played 
and the dance is over. The guests return home and the cowboys make 
preparations to leave with the wagon, which starts out shortly after 
sunup. 

The “outfit” consists of the chuck wagon and the hoodlum wagon, 

1 The menu for the dinner May io, 1927, was as follows: Beef roast, dress¬ 
ing, gravy, creamed Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes smothered in marshmallows, 
pickles, butter, Poinsettia salad, Waldorf salad, coffee, ice cream and cake. In 
the center of the table there was a miniature “outfit” complete in every detail, 
made by Jimmie Moore, Clinton Henry and (Cowboy) Hines. It consisted of 
a chuck wagon, ten bed rolls, a fly, cook and horse wrangler, pot rack, pot hooks 
and pots hanging over the fire, three miniature horses and miniature saddles, 
complete in every detail, with spurs, bridles and ropes lying around. There was 
not a thing left out that would be found around a cow camp. It even had 
towels hanging on the fly ropes and on the spokes of the wagon wheels. 

The midnight lunch consisted of sandwiches, pickles, cake and coffee. 

2 The dinner and dance is primarily for the people employed by the Ranch 
and their invited guests. There should have been only one hundred and thirty 
people at the dance on May 10, 1927. The writer, who was one of the invited 
guests on this occasion, was surprised at the number of self-invited guests. 
There were ninety-one couples who took part in the dance and equally that 
many more who did not dance. Another thing the writer observed was that 
most of the cowboys for whom the dance was given, did not take part in it. 
I asked a number of the boys why they were not taking part in the dance and 
they all gave out the same answer, namely, “That bunch who were not invited 
have crowded in and taken charge of the dance floor.” 


606 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the cook, the wagon boss, the horse wrangler and from fifteen to 
eighteen cowboys. The cook, as the name implies, is the man who 
does the cooking for the outfit; however, a word of explanation with 
reference to him is perhaps necessary. He is “boss supreme for sixty 
feet around the chuck wagon.” This means that when the boys come 
for their meals, they must do as the cook says while within his 
territory. The preparation of a meal is very interesting and odd to 
those who are not familiar with camp life. The cooking is done in 
the open. Two iron rods or “stobs” are driven in the ground a few 
feet apart and a cross bar is placed on these “stobs,” thus making a 
rack to hang pots or buckets on. The fire is built beneath this cross 
bar and everything is cooked in pots hung over this fire except the 
“good sour dough biscuits.” They are cooked in “Dutch ovens.” The 
Dutch oven is a very large thick skillet with three legs under the 
bottom, and a heavy lid fitting on the top. The biscuits are put in 
the oven, under and on top of which live coals of fire are placed. 
After this heating process is done, the cook does not have to worry 
any more about the biscuits, they will brown without burning. Clin¬ 
ton Henry says, “Everybody has an idea that a cowboy doesn’t have 
good meals, but he surely does. Some of these good meals consist 
of brown beans, potatoes, fresh beef, all kinds of dried fruit, differ¬ 
ent varieties of canned goods, syrup, sour dough biscuits and black 
coffee. Black coffee and good sour dough biscuits, after you have 
gone down the rope to about a hundred and fifty calves with the 
temperature at no degrees in the shade would put Fred Harvey’s 
meals on the shelf.” The cook places the food in a row under the 
fly when the boys have all got in. He then says, “All right, fellows, 
come and get it; if you don’t I am going to throw it out.” Each 
cowboy goes by the chuck box, which is in the end of the chuck 
wagon, and gets a tin plate, knife, fork, spoon, tin cup and a serving 
of sugar; then he helps himself to the food in cafeteria style. . . . 

The round-ups on the J A Ranch are divided into two divisions, 
flat work and the canyon work. The flat work is the work on the 
level part of the ranch. It takes about three weeks to finish the work 
in the spring and about the same length of time to complete the 
fall round-up. The canyon work is the working of the canyon pas¬ 
tures. It usually takes longer to work these pastures; especially in 
the spring of the year because this is the rainy season and some¬ 
times the work is held up a day or two at a time because the streams 
are swollen and boggy. When the wagon starts out in the spring 
(and fall, too) it goes to one of these flat pastures. In the spring, 
the work consists of gathering steer yearlings and shippers and 
branding, dehorning and vaccinating calves; the same kind of cattle 
are gathered and the other work is of the same nature in the canyon 
pastures, but a day’s work in the flat is not the same as a day’s work 
in the canyon. There is so much difference that a description of a 


TYPICAL RANCH LIFE 


607 


day’s work in each place will be given. It will be seen that the 
flat work is much easier. 

About four o’clock in the morning the cook yells, “All out, fel¬ 
lows.” The boys saddle their horses, get a cup of coffee, light a 
cigarette and are soon gone on the day’s round-up. However, it 
is not so simple as this, if there are a few “tenderfoots” with the 
outfit and there usually are at the beginning of the season. They 
frequently have a hard time staying on their mounts because the 
horses are not very well broke and are feeling rather gay at that 
time in the morning. It is a very common occurrence to hear a screak¬ 
ing of leather, the cracking of cedar bushes, a dull thud and a horse 
running with the stirrups of the saddle shaking hands above the 
horse’s back every jump he makes. . . . The territory for a day’s 
round-up on the flat is not very large, usually covering six or seven 
miles square, and is usually a short distance from the camp so the 
round-up is made by nine or nine-thirty o’clock. After the round-ups 
are thrown together and the boys change to the cutting horses, the 
business of working the round-up begins. The general working of a 
round-up in the spring and fall vary somewhat. In the spring the 
main business is to brand the calves, gather the stuff that will be 
shipped through the summer such as fat calves and odd heifers and 
to gather the steer yearlings preparatory to delivering or selling and 
gathering the heifer yearlings and their mothers. The calves and 
their mothers are usually cut out first. This is done in order to 
get the calves with their mothers out before the round-up is too 
badly stirred up and the calves and their mothers become separated. 
There are usually some two to four boys working in the round-up 
at a time, owing to the amount of work to be done and the amount 
of help there is to do the work. 

The calves that are to be branded are cut out on one side of the 
round-up, with their mothers, one or two boys cutting all the time, 
and after the biggest end of those are gotten out some of the other 
boys will start another cut. In that cut they will throw the steer 
yearlings and their mothers in so far as they can get them cut out 
together. Sometimes there will be a third cut, depending upon the 
place they are holding the round-up. In that cut will be put the 
shipper stuff and possibly the heifer yearlings. But a great deal of 
the time these three cuts are thrown in one cut. There is, also, 
usually a bunch of cows with calves that were in the round-up the 
day before. Sometimes if they are tallying, they cut those cows 
with their calves that have been branded the day before and tallied 
and run them off. After the herd has been worked and all the classes 
separated into the different cuts, then if they are tallying, the balance 
of the cattle left in the round-up, which consists chiefly of dry cows, 
is taken to the corrals and penned and are tallied and turned out of 


608 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


the pens and thrown back in the cut from which they were rounded. 
Then the several cuts are penned. 

By this time it is usually time to get a bite of dinner. After 
the boys have got a feed of sour dough biscuits, “frijoles” and beef 
they catch a fresh horse and go back to the corrals for the after¬ 
noon’s work. First they tally the shipper stuff, heifer yearlings, steer 
yearlings, etc., and start them out on a “windy” to a holding pasture 
in the flat country near the headquarters where they are held until 
spring round-up is over, and are later worked to suit the occasion. 
After the tallying has all been done, they start the branding. The 
branding operation sometimes is done two different ways, owing to 
the corral they are at and the size of the calves and the number of 
calves. Sometimes when the calves are small and they have a con¬ 
venient crowding pen, they separate the calves from their mothers 
and run them in the crowding pen and the boys get in there and bull¬ 
dog them or flank them. . . . 

The branding work itself consists of putting the stamp J A on 
the calf, marking, vaccinating and dehorning the steer calves. The 
heifers are not dehorned. There are two boys to each roper called 
bull-doggers or calf-wrestlers. They throw the calf and hold it. Then 
there is one man who runs the vaccinating needle, vaccinating for 
both ropers. One man runs the iron and one man runs the knife. 
They each mark and brand after both ropers. Also one man runs 
the dehorners and occasionally one man runs a dope pot. This dope 
contains creosote dip, tar and fish oil which is put on the calves to 
keep the flies away. There is also one other man needed to run the 
forge and keep the irons hot. If there are enough extra men they 
will take it time about relieving those who wrestle the calves. 

After the day’s branding is completed the calves with their mothers 
are taken back to the round-up grounds and they are left set for an 
hour or so until they have became settled, that is the calves have found 
their mothers, etc. Then they are started off the round-up grounds 
in the direction from which they were rounded that morning. Occa¬ 
sionally, there will be quite a number of cows with very young calves 
cut out while the herd is settling and turned back to the direction 
from which they were rounded that morning. This is the usual w*ay 
a round-up is worked on the J A Ranch today; however, no set 
rules can be given which will cover all round-ups. There are many 
variations. Each wagon boss of an outfit determines how the round¬ 
up will be worked and every wagon boss has his own way of working 
a round-up. 

There are five pastures known as the canyon pastures. They are 
Cherokee, Barrel, Tule, Number One and Pleasant. The canyon work 
begins at the lower end of the canyon in Cherokee pasture and they 
work up the canyon and wind up with the working of Pleasant pas¬ 
ture on the upper Palo Duro Canyon. As has been stated before, 


TYPICAL RANCH LIFE 


609 


the canyon work is different in some respects from the flat work. 
Breakfast is served about three-thirty in the morning and sometimes 
as early as three o’clock. Then there is a long ride to the canyon, 
some ten miles before daylight. The country is very rough and fre¬ 
quently the ground is wet and slippery, the cattle are wilder and 
more difficult to gather; the result is the round-up is gotten together 
later in the morning than on the flat. The round-up is usually held 
in the bed of Red River because the alkali flats are slippery and not 
firm enough to run wild cattle on. After the round-up is made the 
rest of the day’s work is about the same as it is on the flat with 
one exception. They always round-up a few “outlaws” or old cattle 
that have been missed for years and these furnish harder work and 
more excitement than the average calf does. Another duty which 
comes in connection with the canyon work, occurs practically every 
day, is that the steer yearlings and shippers that have been gathered 
must be driven out of the canyon into one of the flat pastures so they 
will be handy for shipping later on. These herds are called “windies” 
by the cowboys and every cowboy hates this kind of work. The reason 
they are called windies is because at this time of year the weather is 
very warm, the cattle are contrary and hard to drive, and by the 
time they are gotten out of the canyon, the cattle, the horses and 
the cowboys are all just about winded, or exhausted. 

When the canyon work has been completed, the wagon moves out 
into the flat again and the cowboys spend about a week shaping up 
the shippers and getting them in the shipping pastures. They always 
try to complete this work by the third of July so that the wagon 
can pull into headquarters in time for the boys to celebrate the Fourth 
of July. All of the boys get a three days’ lay-off at this time. 

The shipping of cattle starts right after the boys have had their 
three days’ lay-off. Cattle are shipped once a week as a rule either 
on Saturday or Monday. Whichever day is decided upon is the one 
that is used all the time. This is kept up until about the middle of 
October. Undesirable stuff is shipped first, next fat cows, then young 
heifers; after these about a thousand head of heifer calves, and last 
of all, about a thousand head of old cows; some are fat and some 
are not. The most of the steer calves are sold to local buyers for 
fall delivery and the rest of them are kept by the ranch until spring 
and perhaps later. 

A few of the boys help the wagon boss with the shipping during 
the summer months. Two boys ride the line. The rest of the boys 
go out with the wagon again, but this time the cowboys’ equipment 
consists of work horses or mules, plows, post hole diggers, fresnos, 
scrapers and all other articles necessary for road work, tank build¬ 
ing and fence repairing. During the months of July and August, all 
the fence on the ranch is repaired, the roads are graded and the 
ground tanks are cleaned out and repaired and new ones built wher- 


610 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


ever it is deemed necessary. It goes without saying that this kind 
of work does not appeal to the average cowboy; however, the work 
is not hard. They have breakfast at six in the morning and quit 
early in the afternoon. 

The fall round-up, which usually starts the first of September, 
is very much like the spring work. The main difference is, in the 
fall, the steer yearlings that were branded in the spring, with their 
mothers, are cut into a bunch to themselves and thrown out on a 
windy to a holding pasture near the headquarters where they accu¬ 
mulate as the fall work goes on, to be delivered to local buyers after 
the first of November. Besides these, shipper stuff, poor cows and 
any other poverty cattle that must be fed during the winter months 
and any steer yearlings that were missed in the spring and all the 
heifers and their mothers are all thrown out in the flat pastures near 
headquarters preparatory to the final work in the fall when the 
wagon pulls in. 

When the canyon work is over, the wagon moves out on the flat 
as it did in the spring and the fall deliveries are made. There are 
two deliveries made about ten days apart. The reason there are two 
deliveries is because it is not wise to try to handle too big a round-up 
at one time. These deliveries are very interesting to those who are 
not familiar with them. It must be remembered that these steer 
calves are not weaned yet. The cows and calves are taken to corrals 
and here the calves are separated from their mothers and the calves 
left in the corrals. The cows are driven back to the canyon pastures 
where they are to be wintered and are penned for two days and two 
nights. By this time they are weaned from their calves, and it is 
safe to turn them out. The calves, after their mothers have been 
taken away, are turned out of the corrals and driven back to the 
pastures where they and their mothers were. After going around 
for a few days and not being able to find their mothers, they are very 
well weaned and are in shape to be delivered. Then they are driven 
to Ashtola and shipped or delivered as the case may be. After the 
steer calves have been delivered there is usually a clean-up of a 
few undesirable cattle. These are shipped to market. Then the 
“poverty” cattle (feeders) are worked and passed into definite pas¬ 
tures where they are to winter and be fed. This finishes up the work 
with the cattle. 

The next work to be done is the gathering and picking the “broncs” 
(young horses). When the broncs have been gathered, the wagon 
boss has first choice, the straw boss (assistant to the wagon boss) 
second choice, the oldest cowboy in number of years with the outfit 
has third choice and so on down the line, that is, seniority rules. 
After all the cowboys have picked their horse, the campers pick them 
one, and here again the seniority rule is followed. After all have 
picked, if there are enough, and there usually are, they all pick another 


TYPICAL RANCH LIFE 


611 


in the same order as before. All the broncs are then taken to head¬ 
quarters to be broke. 

Two cowboys usually take the job of breaking these broncs for 
so much per head. When the bronc-riders think they are broke, they 
call the cowboys and let each cowboy ride his own broncs. If the 
cowboy says he is satisfied, his horses are turned over to him, but 
if not the bronc-riders will ride them some more. Each cowboy 
takes his bronc or broncs, as the case may be, after they are broke, 
with him to his winter camp, where they are fed during the winter 
months so that they will be in good shape for the spring round-up. 

This finishes up the fall round-up and the wagon pulls into head¬ 
quarters and is stored in the shed. The boys are assigned to the win¬ 
ter camps. Three are placed at headquarters, two at the Graham 
place and one at each of the other eleven camps, and as Huck Kent 
says, “The big thing is over until May the tenth which is a date 
longed for by the younger cowboys and dreaded by the older ones.” 
The duties of the cowboys during the winter months are very light. 
They ride the range, help feed the poor cattle and do any odd jobs 
that need to be done. This work is all done in the forenoon and they 
are free to do whatever they please in the afternoon. 


CHAPTER XLVI 


MANAGING A TRAIL HERD 

By Charles Goodnight 

[This description of a cattle drive, written by Colonel Goodnight, is quoted 
by H. T. Burton in his “History of the J A Ranch,” Southwestern Historical 
Quarterly, XXXI, 330-335. An abundance of similar material is to be found 
in The Trail Drivers of Texas, compiled and edited by J. Marvin Hunter (The 
P. L. Turner Company, Dallas).] 

So much has been said and written about the old trails that any¬ 
thing else may seem superfluous. But my trail experience was so long 
and varied that perhaps what I have to say may be of interest to 
someone. 

The first thing that I did was to make up my mind that I was 

going to drive and then where to. When this was done I set about 

collecting the outfit. My first step towards this was to round up 
fifty or sixty good horses. Then the mess wagon was made ready 

with provisions to last the time it would take to make the drive. 

For instance, when the Goodnight Trail was laid off I had to pre¬ 
pare for a six hundred-mile stretch; that being the distance from 
Young County, Texas, my starting place, to Fort Sumner, New Mex¬ 
ico, where I expected to sell my cattle. In the meantime, of course, 
I had informed my neighbor stockmen that I was to drive to a north¬ 
ern market and would receive any cattle they wanted to go with the 
herd. I could always count on the cattle reaching me at a certain 
time, and was never over three days in putting a herd of three thou¬ 
sand together. 

Owing to the danger of the Indians and the stampedes I always 
got out of the settlements as soon as possible, for cattle that were 
scattered were much easier traced on the trail than in the settlements, 
owing to the fact that mine would be the only cattle on the trail. In 
my drive of 1866, I had to lay out my own trail, as no trail had been 
made since 1859, and that one not in my direction, when Oliver 
Loving drove a herd out of Texas. I laid out my course by the aid 
of maps and my experience in exploring the frontier when I was 
a ranger, on the frontier during the war. My course led through a 
trackless wilderness, where fierce nomadic tribes of Indians prowled 
at will. 


612 


MANAGING A TRAIL HERD 


613 


I started the herd with eighteen men to drive them. These men 
were thoroughly drilled regarding their places and duties. I always, 
of course, selected two of my most skillful men to be my “pointers.” 
These men were to handle the front of the herd and keep them in 
line on the course given out by the foreman. These pointers were 
never changed from their positions at the head of the herd. How¬ 
ever, they would exchange sides each morning to get some relief 
from the stifling dust from the herd. 

Of course the side men were changed each morning, except the 
corner men, as it is a fact that the further up the herd, the lighter 
the work. This divides the horse labor. Besides three hundred miles 
of the Pecos River is terrific in alkali dust. If you were second 
coming behind to the right today, you would be third left tomorrow. 
You would keep going up each day, and changing sides, until 
you reached the pointers. You then dropped back to first on the 
right. This was kept up during the whole drive. Each man knows 
his place and takes it each morning. The rest of the men were 
divided along the sides in proportion to the length of the herd. I 
always selected three steady men for the rear. These men were 
called “drag hands” for the reason that they were to look out for 
the weaker cattle. Since the speed of the herd was determined by 
the rear it was the duty of the rear men to see that the stronger 
cattle were kept forward and out of the way, so that the weaker 
cattle would not be impeded. This is what we called “keeping the 
corners.” It was necessary to see that the rear of the herd was 
no wider than the “swing,” which was that part between the front 
and rear. Should this not be done, great loss would be occasioned 
from overheating; for the heat from so many moving cattle was 
terrific. If the pointers found that the swing was too long, they 
simply checked up until the herd was the correct length—one-half 
mile. 

Trail hands were well disciplined and were governed entirely by 
signals. They were too far from the leader to receive orders any 
other way. My guards were standing guards, that is to say, that 
the man who had the first watch the first night would have it all the 
way through the drive. If you left the choice to the old hands they 
invariably chose the standing guard. 

I had system on my drives. My friends often laughed about it, 
but the most successful drives were always systematically ordered. 
We ate breakfast just as day broke. The pointers and two other 
men who were to relieve the last night guard, ate as soon as possible. 
If there were signs of Indians the herd was started from its bedding 
grounds and put to grazing as soon as they could see clear enough 
to take care of them and provided there were no Indians about; 
but when there was danger of an attack the herd was kept on the 
bed ground until all hands were mounted and around them, which 


614 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


was done in a very few minutes. The cattle were always headed 
toward the course we were taking. The men ate, saddled and fell 
into place as soon as possible. It is remarkable that during my ten 
years on the trail I rarely ever had a man who would shirk his duty; 
had he been so inclined, he would have been ridiculed out of it. It 
is certain that no deadheads ever stayed in a cow camp any length 
of time. 

As soon as the cattle had grazed sufficiently, they were put in 
moving order without delay. A column of cattle would march either 
slowly or faster according to the distance the side men rode from 
the line. Therefore, when we had a long drive to make between 
watering places and it was necessary to move faster, the men rode 
closer to the line. Under normal conditions, the herd was fifty to 
sixty feet across, the thickness being governed by the distance we 
had to go before resting. When the signal was given to start the 
herd, the foreman would tell the men what width to make the herd. 
Therefore, the order might be ten feet or twenty feet. Narrowing 
the string was called “squeezing them down.” Ten feet was the 
lowest limit, for when the line was this width, gaps came and the 
cattle began trotting to fill in the spaces. Then the pointers would 
check them in front. The fastest steppers would naturally go up 
a little; but they were never allowed to trot. After a herd was handled 
a month or two they became gentler and it was necessary to ride a 
little closer to obtain the same results. 

In laying off a trail the foreman or the owner of the cattle would 
ride ahead twenty or thirty miles—that is, if he did not find water 
sooner. He always rode a good horse and explored both sides of 
the way, in his search for water holes. He preferred to find water 
holes twelve or fifteen miles apart, but he kept going until he did 
find water—with this exception, if he found that he was striking a 
desert, he would return to the herd and inform the men what they 
should expect. Then they knew that the cattle were to be moved 
with all possible speed without actually crowding them. The owner 
then changed horses and rode on ahead once more until he found 
water; then he would go back and signal to the men. This was kept 
up until our destination was reached. Our trail was now established 
and two or three more drives would plainly mark it. This is the 
way I laid off the Goodnight Trail. 

On my first drive across the ninety-six mile desert that lies between 
the Pecos and the Concho Rivers, I lost three hundred head of 
cattle. We were three days and nights crossing this desert, and 
during this time we had no sleep or rest, as we had to keep the cattle 
moving all the time in order to get them to the river before they 
died of thirst. I rode the same horse for the three days and nights, 
and what sleep I got was on his back. As the cattle got closer to 
the water, they had no sense at all and we had to hold them back 
as well as we could. When they reached the stream they swam 


MANAGING A TRAIL HERD 


615 


right across and then doubled back before stopping to drink. During 
this trip those steers got as gentle as dogs. 

After this trip across the desert we made it systematically and 
there was practically no more loss. And the time consumed in mak¬ 
ing the drives would not vary two hours. We would leave the 
Concho at noon and drive that afternoon and all night, the next day 
and the next night. About ten o’clock the next morning we would 
reach the Pecos. The mess wagon was always sent on ahead in 
making these drives and the men would eat and drink as they passed 
it with the suffering cattle. 

But to return to the regular routine of the trail: A herd under 
ordinary conditions was ready for grazing in the morning at eleven 
o’clock. At this time the men stopped for dinner, which had been 
prepared while breakfast was cooking. It was always best to select 
a grazing ground where the ground met to straddle the trail; so that 
the cattle could be thrown to each side. If this was done, the foreman 
or one of the pointers would give the signal to split the herd, by 
waving his hand each way. The swing hands would fall into the 
center, turning the cattle both ways. It was a little troublesome the 
first few days, but the cattle soon learned it. This method brought 
the herd back into form in half the time it would take if the cattle 
were all on one side. 

After this grazing at noon, the cattle would not eat any more until 
they got to water, which we always tried to reach before sundown. 
This gave us ample time to have the cattle filled and everything ar¬ 
ranged for a pleasant night. After they had grazed they were bedded 
for the night. The herd was put in a circle, the cattle being a com¬ 
fortable distance apart. When the drive was first started and the 
cattle were fresh, I used a double guard. That is, half the men 
guarded the first part of the night; the other half the latter part. 
In storms and stampedes we were all on duty. After the herd had 
been out fifteen days, it was “trail broke” and four men were suffi¬ 
cient to guard three thousand cattle. If we were out two or three 
months, the last month two men on duty at a time were sufficient. 
Each guard slept two hours at a time and a little over, for each 
guard always stayed up a little over time. It is a fact that the last 
guard had the shortest hours. After we had been out a month the 
men could easily stay awake their two hours, and when in camp would 
not sleep those two hours. We never had a watch to go by, but divided 
the time by the dipper; it was accurately measured in this way. The 
guards rode around the herd facing each other; in this way they 
passed each other twice as they went around. If a rattlesnake was 
heard in the guard line, the men hearing it informed his companions 
of its whereabouts and the next morning someone would go and kill 
it—rattlesnakes do not move at night. Cattle feared a rattler and 
always gave him a wide berth. 

When cattle are first started, the risk of stampedes is great. They 


616 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


are nervous and easily frightened, the slightest noise may startle 
them into running. Some cattle are stampeders by nature. The 
greatest losses occurred in the night when all was utter confusion. 
A herd was more likely to run on a dark night than on a moonlight 
night. The remarkable thing about it was that the whole herd started 
instantly, jarring the earth like an earthquake. We could not divine 
the course they were taking until they had gone far enough for the 
sound to guide us—unless they were coming toward us. In that case 
I led the herd, holding them back as much as possible. As soon as 
the herd was strung out, we would turn the leaders back. They 
would circle and go into what was called a “mill,” invariably mov¬ 
ing to the right (if any old trailman ever heard of a herd moving 
to the left, I would like to hear from him). 

The cattle would run until they were tired and we gradually spread 
them and they would settle down. We never took the cattle back to 
the same bed ground, for we knew that they would run again. We 
always tried to find the highest ground. Once settled they would 
generally be quiet. As a rule it took several days to rid the cattle 
of the effects of a stampede. The most successful way I found was 
to drive them all night. This way had them under control with the 
men all around them. I placed two of my most skillful men behind 
at what we called the corners and four more in front. If it was dark 
and the cattle had been badly stampeded they would not go far until 
they began to run again; not all of them would be running, how¬ 
ever. Strange to say, there would be about one-half the herd that 
were marching along as though nothing had happened, while the rest 
of the herd would be going at a mad rate. The stampeders would 
come up one side at full speed, but when they reached the front the 
men in the lead would catch them and turn them back on the other 
side; then the men on the corners would drive them back again. 
These cattle would run until they were in great distress. We fol¬ 
lowed this method again the next night and the cattle were cured. 
They never stampeded again. 

On nights when an electric storm was in progress, we could see 
the lightning playing on the horns of the cattle and on the horses’ 
ears, resembling lightning bugs. 

I was the only trailman that I know of who used steer leaders. 
I conceived this idea after the first trip and found it to be of great 
advantage. I used two steers. The bells I put on them were of the 
very best type—ox bells. They were arranged with a strap which 
would easily stop the clapper. When the signal to graze was given 
the man in charge of the steers would fasten down the clappers, and 
turn the steers off the trail. After we had been out for a month, 
should the clapper come loose at night, the whole herd would be on 
its feet in no time. The lead steers were of great advantage in 
swimming the rivers and in penning, for the cattle soon learned to 


MANAGING A TRAIL HERD 


617 


go where the bell called them. Before starting on a trail drive, I 
made it a rule to draw up an article of agreement, setting forth 
what each man was to do. The main clause was that if one man 
shot another he was to be tried by the outfit and hanged on the spot 
—if found guilty. I never had a man shot on the trail. When I 
passed through the ninety-six mile desert, I used to see two lonely 
graves. At Horsehead crossing where we struck the Pecos, there 
were thirteen graves. All the result of pistol shots but one. I 
thought then, as I think now, that all foremen and owners should 
have been responsible for the lives of their men, not only against the 
Indians but against each other. I shall never forget the impression 
made upon me when I would see those lonely graves. The life of 
some dear brother or father had been snuffed out as a result of a 
trifle. 

Taking all in all, my life on the trail was the happiest part of it. 
I wish I could find words to describe the companionship and loyalty 
of the men towards each other. It is beyond imagination. The 
cowboy of the old days is the most misunderstood man on earth. 
Few young people of the younger generation realize that the western 
men—the cowboys—were as brave and chivalrous as it is possible to 
be. Bullies and tyrants were unknown among them. They kept their 
places around a herd and under all circumstances; and if they had 
to fight they were always ready. Timid men were not known among 
them—the life did not fit them. Today many of the richest and 
greatest men of Texas were cowboys. Of the hands I employed 
there are now at least three millionaires. Fewer cowboys have been 
tried for crimes than any other class of men. 


CHAPTER XLVII 


THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE IN 
WEST TEXAS 

By W. C. Holden 

[This selection is from an unpublished manuscript entitled, Frontier Prob¬ 
lems and Movements in West Texas, 1846-1900.] 

Agriculture, as a major industry in West Texas, could not de¬ 
velop until after a system of transportation was provided. The 
cattleman could make his herds walk to market, eat free grass and 
thrive along the way; but the produce of the farmer was dead weight, 
and the expense of hauling it for great distances made farming un¬ 
profitable. Nothing was left for the settlers to do but to raise a few 
cattle, hogs, some feedstuffs, a bale or two of cotton, live as econom¬ 
ically as possible, and agitate for the building of railroads. It was 
not until after the coming of the railroads that agriculture replaced 
cattle raising as the principal industry of the country. There were 
other factors, aside from transportation, which had to be overcome 
before agricultural development could make much headway, such as 
the Indian menace, the prevalent idea that West Texas was not a 
farming country, the antipathy of the cattleman towards the settler, 
the pests and the drouths. 

As long as the Indians made their raids into the frontier settle¬ 
ments, it was impossible for agriculture to make very extensive de¬ 
velopment, even if all the other obstacles had not existed. Figura¬ 
tively speaking, the settler had to hold his rifle in one hand and his 
plow in the other. His eye shifted nervously from the furrow to 
the trees, bluffs, or ravines surrounding the field. He was in constant 
danger of having his w T ork stock driven away, his cattle and hogs 
butchered, his house burned and his family scalped. The matter of 
obtaining farm labor under such unsettled and unsafe conditions was 
out of the question. Agriculture except in the eastern edge of West 
Texas, which was far enough removed from the extreme frontier 
settlements in 1875 to feel some degree of security, had to wait until 
the Indian had departed. 

The idea was generally prevalent, prior to 1885, that West Texas, 
especially west of the Cross Timbers, was not an agricultural country. 
As early as 1865, Sam Newcomb, a school teacher at “Fort Davis,” 

618 


THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE 


619 


recorded in his diary, “Agriculture is not, and doubtless never will 
be, followed here, owing to the long and awful droughts.” 

Numerous statements to the same effect are to be found in the 
newspapers, journals, reports and correspondence from West Texas 
during the 6o’s and 7o’s, and, to a decreasing extent, during the 8o’s. 
The newspapers indulged in a lively and serious discussion in 1880 
and 1881, over the question, “Is West Texas a farming country?” 
As late as June 1, 1885, the Taylor County News emphatically de¬ 
clared, “The idea that this part of Texas will ever be an agri¬ 
cultural country is a great joke of huge proportions.” The impres¬ 
sion had been fast giving way since 1881, but the drouth of 1886 
confirmed it anew. Although the prevailing belief that West Texas 
was not adapted to agriculture did not restrict immigration and settle¬ 
ment, it tended to make many settlers hesitate before they aban¬ 
doned stock raising for farming. 

One of the most fruitful sources of the anti-agricultural propa¬ 
ganda was the cattleman. It was in the live stock journals that the 
strongest arguments appeared to discourage the farmer from going 
west. The cattleman was one of the gravest obstacles to the settle¬ 
ment of Texas by farmers. Perhaps he was sincere in his contention 
that the region was intended by the Creator for a cattle country. 
Incidentally, as long as he could keep the settler back, he could run 
his cattle on free grass. He wanted the free grass to last as long as it 
would; and, consequently, he threw every impediment possible before 
the advance of the settlers. It was not uncommon for many of the 
cattlemen to use severe methods to intimidate the earlier comers. 
When an adventurous frontier settler purchased a desirable tract 
of land located in a cattle baron’s range and attempted to settle on 
it, notice was often served on him that he had better sell out (to the 
cattleman) and leave the country. If he disregarded the warning, 
there was a possibility of the affair being settled permanently by a 
Winchester in the hands of one of the cattleman’s trusted cowboys. 
This practice was not general enough to become the rule, but it did 
happen. The cattle of the settlers would often get mixed-up on the 
range with those of the cattlemen. The farmer’s cattle, often includ¬ 
ing the milk cows, would be gathered in the round-ups and driven 
away. In some counties the farmers were compelled to organize 
stock associations of their own in order to resist the driving off of 
their cattle by the cattlemen. In spite of intimidations, the settlers 
pushed on. 

The cattlemen were forced to buy or lease and fence their pas¬ 
tures. This in turn led to the fence cutting war. Fence cutting was 
indulged in by both the cattlemen and the settlers. The settlers 
would often purchase small tracts of land along the water courses in 
a cattleman’s range, and fence in the water holes at which the cattle 
were accustomed to water. The cowboys would then show their con- 


620 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


tempt for the detested “nester” by riddling the fence. Items like 
the following are numerous in the newspapers of the time: 

We are informed that Mr. Wise’s fence was cut again last Friday night and a 
coffin nailed to one of the posts as a warning to Mr. Wise to keep quiet about it. 
It is also reported that a fence enclosing a pasture of 90 or 100 acres near 
Black Jack Grove has been cut. 

On the other hand, the cattlemen often leased all the land sur¬ 
rounding a settler, or a community of settlers, fenced the entire tract, 
left but a few gates, and put padlocks on them. The settlers would 
retaliate at the first opportunity by cutting miles of the ranchman’s 
fence. This practice went on for more than fifteen years. Not 
infrequently, armed bodies of settlers clashed with armed bodies of 
cowboys. 

The death toll in the fence cutting war has never been computed; 
but the number, if known, would doubtless be astounding. Laws were 
passed against the practice, but that did not end the trouble. At 
last, the cattleman stubbornly gave way. His attitude and the impedi¬ 
ments he improvised very effectively retarded agricultural develop¬ 
ment. 

Various pests helped to discredit West Texas as a farming region. 
The grasshoppers made periodical invasions. The destruction they 
occasioned was often similar to that of a hail storm of widespread 
proportions. They did unusual damage in 1876, 1884, and to a much 
lesser degree in 1891. An idea of the numbers and appetites of the 
grasshoppers in 1876, may be had from the following item from the 
Frontier Echo, September 22, 1876: 

Those red-legged pests made their appearance in this county ten days ago 
and the damage they have done to cotton is immense. Not a leaf is to be seen 
on a cotton stalk in this county. A large portion of the bolls, especially those 
not opened, have been eaten off. Trees and weeds have been stripped of their 
foliage, dry corn stalks not escaping the hungry pests. Tuesday last, they were 
moving north from whence they came, flying in such myriads as to resemble 
white clouds beneath the sun. 

The grasshoppers came and went, but the prairie dog constituted a 
standing foe to the cattleman and farmer alike. It was estimated, in 
1884, that the prairie dog destroyed annually grass and crops to the 
value of more than $1,000,000. Efforts were made to exterminate 
the prairie dogs by legislative aid, but to no avail. The matter of 
extermination was left to private enterprise. Anti-prairie dog mass 
meetings were held. In some communities, it was agreed at these 
gatherings that each man should poison his own dogs; thus, by con¬ 
certed individual action the pest would be eliminated in one season. 
In other communities the citizens would pool their funds, assessing 
each man according to his acreage, and let contracts to regular prairie 
dog exterminating companies. The price varied from ten to fifty 


THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE 


621 


cents per acre, depending upon the intensity of the infestation. Con¬ 
tracts for blocks of land containing from ten to fifty thousand acres 
were frequently let in this way. Both grasshoppers and the prairie 
dog tended to retard agricultural development, just as wolves and 
other predatory animals hindered the sheep industry. 

No doubt, the greatest of all the obstacles, especially after the 
Indians were permanently located on the reservations, were the 
drouths. It was the extensive dry weather that caused the prevalent 
idea that West Texas would never be a farming country. The 
farmers gradually learned by long, and sometimes bitter, experi¬ 
ence how to withstand the ordinary dry weather. They discovered 
what to plant, when to plant, and how to till the crops. 

The precursors of agricultural development were the immigrants. 
The Mexican War tended to check immigration from 1846 to 1848; 
but, in 1849, the lure °f cheap land in Texas was second only to 
that of the gold in California. During November of that year more 
than 5,000 movers, Texas bound, crossed the Arkansas River, at 
Little Rock. Of 315 wagons crossing at one ferry alone, 214 were 
going to Texas. The frontier settlements at the time extended 
roughly from Cooke County on the Red River to Fredericksburg and 
thence to Corpus Christi, running just west of San Antonio. Once 
starteu, the never ending column of immigration moved steadily on 
for the next ten years. During November and December of each 
year the covered wagons on the main roads were seldom out of sight 
of each other. On November 2, 1850, the Northern Standard ob¬ 
served : 

For the last two weeks scarcely a day has passed that a dozen or more 
mover’s wagons have not passed through our town. Most of the immigrants 
we have seen appear to be well prepared to meet the hardship, expense and 
inconvenience attending the establishment of new homes in the wilderness. 

On December 6, 1851, the same newspaper said: 

Day after day it comes increasingly. Whenever we step to the doors or 
south windows of our office, looking out upon the square, we see trains of 
wagons halted, until supplies are purchased and inquiries made about the country 
and the roads. . . . Upon the southern line of travel through the state, as we 
hear, there is the same ceaseless stream, ever moving westward. 

On November 11, 1854, the Standard stated: “The town is almost 
daily filled with wagons of immigrants from Tennessee, Kentucky 
and Alabama/’ Again on December 11, 1858, the same newspaper 
commented: “Immigration exceeds everything we have have ever 
seen. At least fifty wagons per day pass through Clarksville/’ 

In i860, the extreme frontier line of settlement extended roughly 
from Henrietta in Clay County, to Fort Griffin in Shackelford 
County, to Kerrville in Kerr County, and thence to Del Rio in Val 
Verde County. Immigration practically ceased during the Civil War. 


622 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


It was resumed to some extent in 1866, but the newcomers did not 
settle near the frontier. There was still plenty of reasonably cheap 
land to be had in the Grand Prairie and Black Prairie regions of 
Central Texas, and the immigrants preferred to pay a higher price 
for it than to take their chances in the country exposed to Indian 
depredations. Although many people who had fled from their homes 
west of the Western Cross Timbers in 1866 and 1867 had returned 
in 1868 and 1869, the census of 1870 shows that the extreme frontier 
was considerably further east in 1870 than in i860, and that the 
population of all the counties west of the Western Cross Timbers 
was decidedly less in 1870 than in i860. The frontier settlements 
advanced slowly, but steadily in the face of the Indian depredations, 
and by 1875 they had reached the line of federal military posts. 1 
After the decisive Indian campaigns in 1875, immigration increased 
tremendously. The movement for the next twenty-five years 
reached, and even exceeded, that of the 50’s. People came in 
wagons, on horseback, and, after 1881, by train. They came as in¬ 
dividuals, as families and as colonies. In the spring of 1878, 400 
German families from Indiana arrived in Baylor County. They pur¬ 
chased 100,000 acres of land at one dollar and a half per acre and 
paid cash for it. In the fall of the same year a small party of settlers 
under the leadership of Hank Smith, a typical and energetic frontiers¬ 
man, from the vicinity of Fort Griffin, trekked more than a hundred 
miles beyond the line of military posts and founded a settlement in 
Blanco Canyon, Crosby County. The next year, 1879, a colony of 
Quakers from Indiana and Ohio under the leadership of Paris Cox 
purchased eighty-two sections of land in Lubbock and Crosby 
counties and established a settlement at Estacado in Crosby County. 
By 1880, the settlements had reached the hundredth meridian, and a 
few advanced settlers were widely scattered in the region between the 
hundredth and hundred and second meridian. Before 1890, the ex¬ 
treme frontier was entirely gone and the more intense settlement had 
reached the foot of the Plains. During the decade, 1890-1900, the 
settlers began a penetration of the Llano Estacado. 

The transition from cattle raising to agriculture as the predomi¬ 
nant industry was slow. A twilight zone varying from fifty to two 
hundred miles in width intervened. The length of time necessary for 
a locality to pass from one stage to the other was from ten to twenty 
years. The settler, by buying the land in small tracts and fencing 
it, pushed the cattleman westward. He raised a few cattle, perhaps 
some sheep, planted a field of feedstuflfs, corn, sorghum cane, and 
later, kaffir corn and milo maize. As the years passed his fields 

1 The line of military posts consisted of Fort Duncan at Eagle Pass, Fort 
Terrett in Edwards County, Fort McKavett in Menard County, Fort Concho 
in Tom Green County, Fort Griffin in Shackelford County, and Fort Richardson 
in Jack County. 


THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE 623 


tended to become larger and his herd of cattle and his flock of 
sheep smaller. 

The advance of the grain frontier (corn, wheat and oats) across 
West Texas is fairly indicative of the westward movement of the 
farmer. A small amount of grain was grown in the extreme eastern 
part of the area before 1850. During the next ten years the grain 
frontier moved from seventy-five to one hundred miles west. In 
1870, it was practically where it was in i860, but the intensity of 
production within the settlements showed a marked increase; 2,360,- 
514 bushels were raised in 1870 compared with 343,621 bushels in 
i860. In the decade, 1870-1880, the frontier underwent a tremendous 
change, especially in the southwest. The territorial expansion for 
the period was decidedly out of proportion to the intensity of grain 
production. During the next decade the grain frontier vanished, 
and by 1890 some grain was being raised in all the arable sections 
of the state. Extensive cultivation had begun along the eastern edge 
of the plains. Notwithstanding the set-back of the drouth of 1886, 
the production increased fourfold during the ten-year period. The 
settlement of the country and the opening of new farms continued 
steadily through the decade, 1890-1900. The production at the end 
of the period was 40,238,000 bushels as compared with 28,465,534 
bushels in 1880. 

The one thing which marked the end of the period of transition 
and the beginning of the supremacy of agriculture was cotton. It 
was the chief money crop, and after the cotton frontier had once 
reached a given point, the stock farmer, in the course of a few years, 
became a cotton farmer, provided the vicinity was at all adapted to 
the raising of cotton. 

Prior to 1850 no cotton was raised in West Texas. Between 1850 
and i860, the cotton frontier was pushing westward for a distance 
varying from twenty-five miles west of San Antonio to a hundred 
miles west of Fort Worth, but cotton raising within this region was 
in the experimental stage. The yield did not average more than fifty 
bales to the county in i860. The Civil War and the Indian depreda¬ 
tions of 1866 and 1867 caused the cotton frontier to lose ground 
during the next decade. In i860, 188 bales were raised west of the 
Western Cross Timbers compared with eighty-seven bales in 1870. 
West Texas as a whole made a gain during the decade; 879 bales 
were reported in i860, and 6,878 in 1870. The climatic conditions 
of the two years were about the same. The increase was in the tier 
of counties between Blanco and Denton counties. In this region 
cotton had become the predominant money crop. 

The cotton frontier advanced slowly between 1870 and 1875 ; but, 
beginning in 1875, it gained a momentum which it never lost until it 
had swept across the state. During the decade of 1870-1880, it moved 
about a hundred miles in the northwestern and about twenty-five miles 


624 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 



AMP JHOtV/A/G D/STP/3UT/0// OF GPA/N FOP /860. 
BASED ON FEDERAL CENSUS. /360. 



MAP SWIV/A/G D/S TP/ B U T/ ON OF 6PA//V FOP /6dO 
BA5ED ON FEDEPAL CENSUS. /'330 










































































































THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE 


625 




M4P 5H0W/NG D/STP/Bt/T/ON OF GPA/tV FOP /S90 
BASED OH EEDEEAL CENSUS. /S90 



MAP 5//0W/A/6 D/5TP/3UT/0A/ OF GPA//V FOP /900 

BASED ON EEDEPAL CENSUS. /900 







































































































































626 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 



D/5 TP/BUT/O// OF COT TO//. /860 

BASED OM FEDERAL CENSUS, /860 



D/2TF/DUT/0N OF COTTO/Z /880 

BASED ON FEDERAL CENSUS ; / 8d0 









































































































THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE 


627 



D/5TP/BUT/0N OF COTTON. 1390 

BASED ON EEDEPAL CENSUS. /890 



D/5 TP IB U T/ON OF COTTON. 1900 

BASED ON SEDEBAL CENSUS 1900 





































































































































































628 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


in the southwestern parts of the state. By 1876, a few gins had been 
built in the tier of counties between Bandera and Clay counties. 
The gins helped to stimulate production. The cotton had to be hauled 
to the railroad points of Fort Worth, Austin, or San Antonio. A 
farmer could haul three bales of ginned cotton as easily as he could 
haul one bale of seed cotton. Total production increased from 6,878 
bales in 1870, to 79,181 bales, in 1880. 

The decade, 1880-1890, witnessed a great advance of the cotton 
frontier as well as increase in total production. The average advance 
was about one hundred miles along the entire cotton frontier. The 
production in 1890 was 250,452 bales. The phenomenal increase was 
due to railroad transportation. With railroad facilities nearer at 
hand, the stock farmers regarded cotton culture more seriously, not¬ 
withstanding the fact that many of them west of the Western Cross 
Timbers were still skeptical as to whether cotton could ever be grown 
profitably. The greater part of the development of the decade came 
in the last three years. Very little cotton was raised in 1885, prac¬ 
tically none in 1886, and the yield was less than normal in 1887. 
Abilene shipped 2,061 bales in 1888 and 10,000 bales the next year. 
In September, 1888, the first bale ever ginned west of Abilene was 
sold at Sweetwater. Two years later more than 5,000 bales were 
shipped from the various railroad stations between Abilene and Big 
Spring. 

During the next decade, 1890-1900, the cotton frontier practically 
disappeared. By 1900 a little cotton was being raised everywhere 
that the soil and climate permitted. East of the caprock of the Plains 
the farmers, were relying on cotton as the main money crop. The 
plains region was still primarily a cattle country, but a few small 
patches of cotton were to be found, widely scattered, over the entire 
area. The increase in production during the period was not as great 
as might be expected. 2 The year, 1900, brought a production of 
354,446 bales, which was an increase of 104,000 bales over 1880. By 
1900, agriculture may be said to have been paramount as far west 
as the 101st meridian. 

Pecan raising received a marked stimulus as a result of the drouth 
of 1886. Pecan trees grew along the courses of practically all the 
streams east of the hundredth meridian. No pecans were raised in 
1886, but the following year an excellent crop was made. The field 
crops were short that year. The pecans were gathered, and, in some 
counties, brought more money than the cotton, wheat and oats com¬ 
bined. This fact made a profound impression on the people, since 
the crop came at a time when money was badly needed. The idea 

2 The price of cotton may have had something to do with the greater pro¬ 
portional increase in cotton production for the decade, 1880-1890, than in the 
following decade. Between 1880 and 1890 the average price of cotton was about 
ten cents a pound; between 1890 and 1900, it was less than eight cents a pound. 


THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE 


629 


became general that pecans had drouth resisting qualities. For the 
next three years there was a great amount of agitation in the news¬ 
papers; the people were urged to care for, cultivate, and improve the 
trees they already had, and to plant pecan orchards. One enthusi¬ 
ast, a citizen of Brown County, planted four hundred acres in pecans 
in 1890. After a time, interest in the pecan business waned and no 
more was heard of it. Good pecan crops continued to be made every 
few years, but the people ceased to think of pecans as a substitute for 
cotton as a regular money crop. 

When the first settlers reached Blanco Canyon, Crosby County, in 
1878, they found hundreds of acres of wild currants growing there. 
An attempt was made to commercialize the currant business. The 
settlers gave the matter wide publicity by sending complimentary 
boxes of the fruit to eastern newspaper editors. All efforts proved 
futile, and after a few months the currant business dropped from 
sight. 

By 1889, considerable interest was being manifested in fruit trees. 
The fruit tree agent was busy, visiting every farm house in the 
country, on horseback or in his buggy, and showing the farmer and 
his family large, wonderfully colored pictures of this juicy peach and 
that delicious apple. Almost every farmer, after he settled in West 
Texas, bought a number of trees and attempted to start an orchard. 
His efforts came to naught far oftener than they succeeded. The 
soil of the greater part of West Texas was not adapted to the raising 
of any kind of trees other than the native mesquite. Orchards could 
be successfully grown only in those communities which had a deep 
sandy soil. 

The planting of Johnson grass became widespread during the 8o’s 
and 9o’s. The plant was hearty, and it had excellent drouth resisting 
qualities. It matured quickly and made good hay. Once started, it 
was next to impossible to get rid of it. The more one would plow, 
harrow and break its roots, the thicker it would grow and the more 
it would spread. Although the farm journals warned the farmers 
not to plant it, the merchants continued to ship the seed in by the 
car load, and the farmers continued to sow it. The farmers of East 
Texas began petitioning the Legislature in the late 80’s to pass a law, 
making the sowing of Johnson grass illegal. Finally, an act was 
passed in 1895 forbidding the sale or gift of the seed or roots of the 
grass. A feature of this law prohibiting the sowing or planting of 
Johnson grass on land not one’s own property was evidently aimed 
at tenants. The press in West Texas vigorously denounced the meas¬ 
ure. Local public opinion was strongly against the law, and it could 
never be enforced. The farmers kept on planting Johnson grass, 
much to their later chagrin. 

The low price of cotton from 1890 to 1900 caused the newspapers, 
farm journals and public-spirited persons to wage a never-ending 


630 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


campaign in an attempt to get the farmers to diversify. The farmers 
were urged to take up stock raising again as a complement to cotton 
raising, but cotton has always been truly a “king.” Once he invaded 
a new country and became established, he would tolerate no rivals. 
A farmer who had raised cotton was loath to give it up, even though 
he was aware that he was courting financial ruin by continuing to 
depend upon it. 

An effort was made to get the people to take up bee-tending. A 
number of farmers did try it half-heartedly. Several bee raisers’ 
associations were organized in different sections. Their existence was 
brief, for conditions for bees were generally unfavorable in West 
Texas with the exception of a district in the southwest in the vicinity 
of Uvalde County. The farmers’ wives were urged, with some very 
appreciable results, to do extensive canning of fruits and vegetables. 
The culture of castor beans was recommended. In 1889, some 
authority on the farmer’s woes advanced the idea that broom corn 
would be the farmer’s salvation. The newspapers took it up. Won¬ 
derful tales were related as to its drouth resisting qualities, how the 
immense yields of broom straw would constitute a money crop, how 
the plant produced as much forage as sorghum cane, and how from 
$20 to $40 worth of seed per acre could be threshed from the heads. 
A few farmers tried a small patch of broom corn, but for various 
causes found they had better stick to cotton. During the unusually 
favorable seasons of 1890 and 1891, a number of ingenious local 
editors advised their readers to plant tobacco as an experimental crop. 
A few of them did try it, but neither the soil nor the climate were 
adapted to its growth. 

A noticeable thing about the diversification campaigns of the 
decade, 1890-1900, was that no one suggested hog raising. People 
raised hogs for domestic purposes, but nobody said anything about 
hog raising as a source of money returns. The reasons for the silence 
on this subject are problematical. Perhaps it was due to a general 
idea that hog raising belonged to a timbered country where a heavy 
mast was available. It is true that the price of hogs during the 
period was low, but, compared with cheap cotton, they might have 
been profitably raised, especially during years when a surplus feed 
crop was made. 

The West Texas farmer had one trait which he usually acquired 
after his arrival in the country, and a trait which his eastern brother 
did not have, an aversion for all kinds of walking farming implements. 
When he immigrated to the west he carried with him, as a rule, the 
farm tools he had previously used, which consisted of a walking 
turning plow, a walking planter, and a walking cultivator. He had 
scarcely arrived when he began to develop a strong dislike for walk¬ 
ing. The reasons were two-fold. In the first place, an aversion for 
walking was an indigenous trait of the country. The Plains Indians, 


THE DEVELOPMENT OF AGRICULTURE 


631 


especially the Comanches, had a profound contempt for walking as 
a means of locomotion. A Comanche off of his horse was indeed 
an awkward sight. The cowboy had an uncanny endurance as long 
as he was on horseback. He could stay in the saddle for days and 
nights at a time under the most strenuous circumstances, but to ask 
him to walk for an hour, even when he was fresh and rested, was the 
surest way to break down his morale. When the farmer arrived 
he found the same natural influences silently working on him. In 
the second place, the amount of ground one man could cultivate in 
West Texas was so much greater than that one man could till in a 
country where stumps, rocks, and grass prevailed, that much more 
walking was necessary for the requisite amount of plowing and cul¬ 
tivation. The result was that the newcomer, as soon as possible, 
exchanged his turning plow for a sulky plow, his walking planter for 
a riding planter and his walking cultivator for a riding cultivator. 

A method of dry land farming gradually developed. The average 
settler had a profound contempt for scientific farming, “book farming” 
as he called it. After experiencing a few dry spells, he developed a 
system of his own. He seldom deliberately carried on experimenta¬ 
tion ; but he learned items from his neighbors, and made the most 
of his own successes and failures. The fundamental principles of dry 
land farming were simple. It stood to reason that if in an average 
year there were a limited amount .of rainfall, two things must be 
done. First, the soil must be cultivated in such a way as to catch 
and retain the greatest amount of moisture; second, crops must be 
planted which had the most powerful drouth-resisting strength. Both 
reason and experience taught that the land should be broken deep 
early in the season in order to catch the winter rains. If the crops 
were planted as early as possible in the spring, it would tend to 
enable the plants to mature before the extremely hot weather of mid¬ 
summer. It was possible to plant feed crops late in the summer. 
They could then get their growth in the cooler weather of early fall. 
In either case the fields had to be cultivated frequently in order to 
keep a loose mulch on the surface of the ground. The mulch broke 
up the capillary action in the ground, and made it possible to retain 
the greatest amount of moisture for the use of the plants. Milo maize 
and kaffir corn came in time to be recognized as having drouth resist¬ 
ing qualities. In the later years they almost entirely replaced com 
as a feed crop. Certain types of sorghum cane and cotton plants were 
found to be better adapted to dry weather than other types. 

The settlers who migrated to West Texas during the period when 
agriculture was replacing cattle raising as the leading industry wit¬ 
nessed an exciting, colorful, picturesque, and, in earlier times, danger¬ 
ous, period of history. They saw the Indian sullenly retiring to his 
reservation, and the cattleman doggedly retreating to the arid region 
of extreme southwest Texas and New Mexico. They watched the 


632 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


last cattle drives go up the trail, and endured with dull fortitude the 
blighting effects of the West Texas drouths. They awaited the com¬ 
ing of the railroads with fervent expectancy, and enthusiastically talked 
about imaginary mineral deposits. They danced, ran horse races, 
drank strong liquor, went to camp meetings, got religion, became pro¬ 
hibitionists, and were content with their home-made amusements. 
Meanwhile, agriculture was slowly becoming supreme. 


CHAPTER XLVIII 


SUGGESTIONS FOR THE STUDY AND WRITING 
OF LOCAL HISTORY 

By Walter P. Webb 

[These suggestions were prepared by Professor Webb for the guidance of 
high school students who enter the local history contest which he has conducted 
for some years at the University of Texas. The selection is adapted from The 
Texas History Teachers ' Bulletin , XII, 7-15 (October 22, 1924).] 

Local history is the history which may be found in your own 
community. It is the history of your school, your church, your town, 
courthouse, or of some interesting person. The story of an Indian 
fight that occurred near your home is local history, as is the account 
of a drought, a flood, or a fire. Local history is not the story of 
important men or of great events. It is likely to be the story of the 
unimportant. In detail it is likely to be extremely interesting; in the 
aggregate it is of great importance. From both points of view it is 
worth having. 


Subjects for Local History 

The subjects for local historical essays are too numerous to cata¬ 
logue. The pupil is free to choose anything that interests him and 
that seems to offer sufficient material. The following list is meant 
to be suggestive. Study this list carefully and pick out a subject 
that is adapted to your particular community. 

1. History of the County. 

a. First settlement. 

b. Name of town. 

c. First town. 

d. Location of county seat. 

e. Historic events that have happened in the county. 

f. Part the county has taken in national affairs. 

2. History of the Town. 

a. First settlement, reason for, date. 

b. Name of town. 

c. Coming of railroad. 

d. Other important events. 

633 


634 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


3. History of Buildings and Institutions. 

a. Courthouse. 

b. Churches. 

c. Forts. 

d. Missions. 

e. Newspapers. 

f. Schools. 

g. Residences. 

Where possible, pictures of the bulidings should be submitted 
along with the essay. 

4. History of Development of Natural Resources. 

a. Mines. 

b. Oil fields. 

c. Mineral wells. 

d. Farms and ranches. 

5. History of Foreign Settlements. 

a. German. 

b. Italian. 

c. Polish. 

d. Jewish. 

e. Swedish. 

f. Bohemian. 

g. Slavic. 

6. History of Your Own Family. The advantage of writing on 
this subject is that you would have access to all the materials 
which your family has preserved. 

7. Biography of Interesting Persons. 

a. Soldiers. 

b. Texas Rangers. 

c. Politicians. 

d. Preachers. 

e. Farmers. 

f. Cattlemen, Cowboys, Trail Drivers. 

g. “Bad Men.” 

h. Sheriffs and Peace Officers. 

i. Old Settlers. 

Pictures of these persons should be obtained when possible. 

8. History of Events. 

a. Indian fights and Indian treaties. 

b. Political campaigns. 

c. Cattle stampedes. 

d. Droughts. 

e. Floods. 


SUGGESTIONS FOR THE STUDY OF LOCAL HISTORY 635 


f. Feuds. 

g. Revival meetings. 

h. Law suits. 

i. Fairs. 

9. Miscellaneous. Under this head may be placed subjects that 
do not seem to come under the above headings, for example, 
local legends, stories of mines, legends about old houses or 
forts. In writing avoid “boosting” your town or county. Give 
the facts and let them speak for themselves. 


Sources of Local History 

The materials from which history is written are called the sources 
of history. In this contest, historical sources are classified as: (1) 
oral, (2) published, (3) unpublished or manuscript sources. Each 
of these is discussed briefly and illustrated. 

1. Oral Sources. In writing local history, oral sources are of 
much importance. This material can be gathered only by talk¬ 
ing with the people of the community, old settlers, soldiers, 
Indian fighters, county officers, and others. It is often very 
interesting to gather this material, and in doing so, one hears 
many curious tales of “the good old times.” These accounts 
should be written down in a notebook just as they are given, 
with the date and the full name of the narrator. Thus the 
oral source will be reduced to a written source. The oral source 
is not the best historical source, but in local history it is indis¬ 
pensable, and often has a human interest lacking in the written 
sources. 

2. Printed Sources. There are three classes of printed sources 
which may be found in studying local history: books (including 
pamphlets), magazines, newspapers. 

a. Books. Outside the cities there are few books that deal 
with local affairs. However, a thorough canvass should be 
made for such as exist. There are histories of several 
counties, and where these exist they should be consulted. 
All books dealing with your particular locality should be 
consulted, but essays should not be based wholly on books. 

b. Magazines. Magazine material is likely to be more difficult 
to find than material in books. Though there are certain 
Texas magazines which will prove valuable provided you 
can get access to them. Frontier Times, published by J. 
Marvin Hunter, Bandera, Texas, The Southwestern His¬ 
torical Quarterly, published by the Texas State Historical 
Association, Austin, and The Southwest Review, published 
by P. L. Turner Company, Dallas, are examples. If 


636 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


these magazines have published articles about your locality, 
you may find copies of them in some home. 

c. Newspapers. Newspaper files will prove a most valuable 
source. Every town has its local paper, and every editor 
keeps a file of his own paper which goes back over a period 
of years. The local editor will gladly give you permission 
to read these files. If you wish information about some 
important event that occurred in the town in September, 
1900, you can turn to that date in the newspaper and find 
the accounts which were written of this event. 

3. Unpublished Sources. There are many varieties of such 

sources, some of which will be listed below. 

a. Letters. Letters are perhaps the best historical sources. 
If you are writing an account of a soldier who was killed 
in war, his letters to his family and to his friends will be 
of greatest value. Every family preserves certain letters, 
and many families preserve all their letters over a long 
period of years. It may be that you will find among these 
files letters of famous men. There may be letters from 
generals, governors, or other important historic characters. 

b. Diaries. It is often the case that some individual has kept a 
diary in which he recorded from day to day his experiences. 
For example, one man in San Antonio went with a cattle 
herd from near San Antonio to Kansas. Each day he wrote 
down the things that happened that day. This diary makes 
a valuable source for the history of the Cattle Trail. Pupils 
should canvass the whole town and community for such 
diaries. 

c. Scrapbooks. Scrapbooks are less valuable as source material 
than letters and diaries, but still they are worthwhile. 
In them you are likely to find odds and ends of newspaper 
clippings, pictures, verse, and various items which happened 
to interest the maker. Sometimes you may find a combina¬ 
tion diary and scrapbook. 

d. Reminiscences. It is often the case that some person will 
write an account of his life, or of interesting events which 
he has witnessed, and never publish it. One man may write 
a long account of his experience in the Civil War in order 
that he may leave the record for his children and grand¬ 
children ; another a history of his county; a third the history 
of the town. An effort should be made to discover any such 
manuscript. The county courthouse is rich in manuscript 
sources. The surveyor’s office, the county clerk’s office, 
the county school superintendent’s office, and other offices 
are filled with records about land, marriage records, and 
school affairs. 


SUGGESTIONS FOR THE STUDY OF LOCAL HISTORY 637 


Where to Look for Material 

In the discussion of sources, the probable location of material has 
been indicated. However, for the convenience of the pupils and for 
the sake of thoroughness, a fairly complete list of “places to look” is 
set down. 

1. Homes. The homes of old families will yield the richest his¬ 
torical material. Private letters, diaries, scrapbooks, all will 
be found in the homes. Scrupulous care must be observed in 
using these sources. Unless the owners are convinced that 
their material will be carefully handled and not injured in any 
way they will prefer not to lend it for use. 

2. Public Library. In towns and cities that have a public library 
pupils will be able to find newspaper files, books and other 
records of interest. The librarian will be glad to aid and advise 
you. 

3. Local Historical Society. In many places there are local his¬ 
torical socities whose members devote themselves to the study 
of local history. These frequently contain collections of mate¬ 
rial which will be of great service. Consult the president, sec¬ 
retary, or librarian of your historical society. 

4. Newspaper Office. The local editor will always have in his 
office a file of his own newspaper over several years, and may 
have files of other papers too. By all means consult these files, 
and talk with your editor about subjects in which you may be 
interested. 

5. The County Court House. In the offices of the county court 
house you will find the public records of the county. You 
should talk with the various county officers; and, if possible, 
get access to their records in which you are interested. This 
may not be an easy matter, but if you are tactful, you can 
secure much material. 

The following officers should be visited: 

a. County Judge, who can give information about political con¬ 
ditions, and about famous cases that have been tried in court. 

b. County Clerk, who records all the public transactions in the 
county, land deeds, marriage certificates, etc. 

c. Sheriff, who can give information about criminals, law¬ 
breakers, and important cases that have been tried in court. 

d. Surveyor. The surveyeor will be better acquainted with 
the county than any man you will find. He can give in¬ 
formation about old land marks, Indian encampments, land 
disputes, and law suits. 

e. County School Superintendent. In his office you will find 
the records pertaining to the schools of the county. From 


638 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

the Superintendent you can learn when schools were estab¬ 
lished, how they were built, and how they developed. 

6. The City Hall. In the city hall you will find the records for 
the city. You should consult the police department and the fire 
department for information. 

7. Individuals. In every town and community there is some indi¬ 
vidual who is a teller of good stories, some one who is full of 
reminiscences of the past. It is fun to draw out these stories 
and write them down. There is no rule by which you can find 
these individuals, but you will recognize them when you find 
them. They may be as full of legends as of fact, but in this 
case the legends are valuable too, provided they are of local 
interest. The legend often represents what the people think 
is true, and it is therefore of historical importance. 

Steps in Writing Local History 

After the student has chosen his subject and located the material, 
he should then proceed in a systematic manner to the perparation for 
the writing of the essay. This preparation will consist of two parts: 
(1) Reading and Note-taking, and (2) Organizing and Writing. 

Directions for preparation of paper: 1 

1. Reading and Note-Taking. 

a. Having chosen your subject in consultation with your in¬ 
structor, begin to collect your material. Read the books and 
whatever material you may find on your subject in order 
to get the facts well in hand. 

b. Take notes on all that you read or hear that bears on your 
subject. This note-taking is of the greatest importance. 
Your notes may be taken from books, magazines, news¬ 
papers, scrapbooks, or from narratives which are told to 
you. But take these notes you must . Take notes on loose 
cards or sheets of paper of convenient size. You may use 
a bound note-book in getting oral stories, but you can later 
transfer these notes to cards or loose sheets. 

Place but one note on each page. Write on but one side of the 
paper. Write the subject of the note at the top and the reference at 
the bottom, using (in case of a book) the last name of the author, 
title in abbreviated form, volume and page. In taking oral stories, 
note the name and initials of your informant, and the date on which 
you heard the story. 

1 These directions are taken largely from Tryon, The Teaching of History 
in Junior and Senior High Schools, pp. I39ff f a book that every teacher would 
find of great value. 


SUGGESTIONS FOR THE STUDY OF LOCAL HISTORY 639 


c. Before leaving a reference on which you have taken notes, 
secure your complete bibliographical data. For a book give 
the author’s full name, title of work, date and place of pub¬ 
lication, and the volume number. For magazines and news¬ 
papers, give name of publication, date of the issue you have 
used, and the page. Also, where possible, give name of 
author of the article. 

d. In taking notes you may paraphrase, quote directly, sum¬ 
marize, or outline. The first and second of these forms will 
prove of the most value when you come to write your 
paper. Occasionally thoughts will come to you when reading 
a reference; if they do, jot them down at once. 

e. All notes should be legible. Great care should be taken with 
direct quotations, where spelling, puncutation, and capital¬ 
ization must be exactly as they are in the matter quoted. 
To make sure of this on finishing your copy always check 
it against the original. 

2. Organizing and Writing. 

a. When you have finished your reading, go through your notes 
and classify them. They will be likely to fall into three or 
four large groups. 

b. Make a brief outline of the paper as you propose to write it. 
You should write with the greatest care. Make every effort 
to present the facts clearly and accurately. 

c. Form for completed paper. 

(1) On the first page write nothing but the title. 

(2) On the second page give a brief foreword or preface. 
In this state what you have tried to accomplish in your 
paper, your point of view, and special difficulties you 
have had. Tell briefly how you collected your material, 
whether it is based primarily on books, magazines, news¬ 
papers, unpublished letters and manuscript, or on oral 
report. If you are writing about your family, do not 
say “My father, etc.,” but call the person by name. 

(3) On the page following the preface repeat the title; skip 
two spaces or lines and begin the body of your paper. 

(4) Place the bibliography last. Include in the bibliography 
only references actually used in the preparation of your 
paper and arrange them in alphabetical order. 

( 5 ) Write your final draft on regular typewriter paper, size 
8 j 4 x 11. Leave a wide margin on the left and double 
space the lines. 

3. Footnotes. Footnotes will not be required in this contest, but 

they may be used to advantage in certain instances. It is par¬ 
ticularly advisable to use footnotes when giving direct quota- 


640 READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 

tions, as it saves giving the name of the author and title of the 
book in the body of the paper. The footnotes should be placed 
at the bottom of the page. 

4. The Complete Bibilography. 

a. Confine your bibliography to the titles actually used in work¬ 
ing up your paper. 

b. Arrange it alphabetically by authors. 

c. The order of detail is illustrated below: 

Olmstead, F. L., A Journey in the Back Country. New York, 
i860. 

d. Include in the bibliography the full name and address of all 
persons who contributed material to your essay. 


BOOK LIST 


The list which follows contains the books from which selections 

have been taken, whether in print or out of print, and a few of the 

most useful available references for additional reading. 

Barker, Eugene C., The Life of Stephen F. Austin (P. L. Turner Com¬ 
pany, Dallas, 1925). A careful study of the history of Texas 
and of its relations with Mexico and the United States, 1820-1836. 
$5-°c. 

Barker, Eugene C., Mexico and Texas, 1821-1835 (P. L. Turner Com¬ 
pany, Dallas, 1928). An analysis of the causes of the Texas 
revolution. $2.50. 

Barker, Eugene C. (editor), The Austin Papers, three volumes. 
Volume I, in two Parts, was published by the Government Printing 
Office, Washington, D. C., as Volume II of the Report of the 
American Historical Association for 1919. Volume II was pub¬ 
lished in the same way as the Report of the same association 
for 1922. These two volumes, in three Parts, can be bought at 
a nominal price from the Superintendent of Documents, Washing¬ 
ton, D. C. Volume IV was published by the University of Texas 
Press, and can be bought of the Press for $4.00. The Austin 
Papers are an invaluable source for the history of Texas from 
1820 to 1836. 

Barker, Potts, and Ramsdell, A School History of Texas (Row, Peter¬ 
son and Company, Evanston, Illinois). This book, though designed 
for pupils in the sixth grade, is useful for carrying on the narrative 
between the selections given in these Readings. It contains, in 
the Appendix, a detailed outline of Texas history which will assist 
the student in organizing the material in the Readings. 

Binkley, William C., The Expansionist Movement in Texas, 1836-1850 
(University of California Press, Berkeley, 1925). A careful study 
of a phase of the history of the Republic of Texas. 

Castaneda, Carlos E. (editor and translator), The Mexican Side of the 
Texas Revolution (P. L. Turner Company, Dallas, 1928). Con¬ 
tains accounts of the Texas campaign by Santa Anna and other 
Mexican generals and participants in the campaign. $5.00. 

Clark, R. C., The Beginnings of Texas, 1684-1718 (University of 
Texas Press, 1907). An excellent study from Spanish and 
French sources of the beginning of international rivalry in 
Texas. Out of print. 


641 


642 


READINGS IN TEXAS HISTORY 


Dobie, J. Frank (editor), Publications of the Texas Folklore Society: 
Volume IV, Legends of Texas (1924); Volume VI, Texas and 
Southwestern Lore (1927). These volumes contain a wealth of 
illustrative material and offer many suggestions for original in¬ 
vestigations in local history. They can be had from the Texas 
Folklore Society, Austin. $2.50 each. 

Eby, Frederick, The Development of Education in Texas (The Mac¬ 
millan Company, New York, 1925). A comprehensive survey of 
the history of education in Texas. $2.50. 

Eby, Frederick, Education in Texas: Source Materials (University of 
Texas Press, Austin, 1918). This is a valuable compilation, con¬ 
taining 963 pages of source material on all phases of the history 
of education in Texas. Price on application to the University 
of Texas Press. 

Gammel, H. P. N. (compiler), Laws of Texas, ten volumes (Gammel 
Book Store, Austin, 1898). A compilation of the laws of Texas, 
1821-1897. Volume I is especially valuable for the colonial history 
of Texas. 

Garrison, George P., Texas: A Contest of Civilizations (Houghton 
Mifflin Company, Boston, 1903). An excellent brief presentation 
of Texas history for the Spanish and early Anglo-American 
periods, 1528-1845. It has a useful but very sketchy account of 
the period of statehood from 1846 down to 1903. 

Garrison, George P., Diplomatic Correspondence of the Republic of 
Texas, three volumes. Published by the Government Printing 
Office, Washington, D. C. The volumes can be bought at a nom¬ 
inal price from the Superintendent of Documents. 

Gulick, Charles Adams and others (editors), The Papers of Mirabeau 
Buonaparte Lamar, five volumes (Texas State Library, Austin). 
Lamar collected these documents with the purpose of writing a 
history of Texas. They are therefore comprehensive in character 
and are especially valuable for the history of Texas during the 
periods of colonization and Republic. Sold at a nominal price 
by the State Library. 

Hunter, J. Marvin (compiler and editor), The Trail Drivers of Texas 
(P. L. Turner Company, Dallas). A mine of biographical and 
historical material relating to the cattle industry and to cattle men. 

Johnson, F. W., Texas and Texans, edited and brought down to date 
by Eugene C. Barker and E. W. Winkler. Contains Johnson's 
manuscript of the history of Texas from 1820 to 1836, with sup¬ 
plementary chapters by the editors bringing the narrative down 
to 1898. Out of print. 

Miller, E. T., A Financial History of Texas (The University of Texas 
Press, Austin). This is an exhaustive study of the financial history 
of Texas from 1821 to 1916. 

Payne, Leonidas Warren, Jr., A Survey of Texas Literature (Rand 


BOOK LIST 


643 


McNally and Company, Chicago, 1928). A brief historical study 
of the writings of Texans. Fifty cents. 

Potts, Charles S., Railroad Transportation in Texas (University of 
Texas Press, Austin, 1909). The only comprehensive study of 
the history of transportation in Texas. Unfortunately the book 
is out of print. 

Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association and the South¬ 
western Historical Quarterly, thirty-two volumes down to 1929. 
Published by The Texas State Historical Association, Austin, 
Texas. The first fifteen volumes bear the title, Quarterly of the 
Texas State Historical Association; the new title, Southwestern 
Historical Quarterly, begins with Volume XVI. This magazine, 
as can be seen from the references in these Readings, is an in¬ 
valuable source for original documents and special studies in Texas 
history. Complete files of the Quarterly can be bought from the 
Association by addressing the Secretary, Austin, Texas. 

Ramsdell, Charles W., Reconstruction in Texas (Columbia University 
Press, New York, 1916). The best study of the political and 
social history of Texas from 1861 to 1874. $3.00. 

Rives, George Lockhart, The United States and Mexico, 1821-1848, 
two volumes (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1913). Volume 
I is an excellent study of Texas history, with the emphasis on 
its international relations, from 1820 to 1846. $8.00 for the two 
volumes. 

Smith wick, Noah, The Evolution of a State (Gammel Book Company, 
Austin, 1900). An entertaining and valuable volume of rem¬ 
iniscences of the period of Anglo-American colonization of 
Texas. It is out of print. 

Southwestern Political Science Quarterly (edited chiefly by members 
of the faculty of the Department of Government, University of 
Texas). Nine volumes, to 1929. This magazine is a valuable 
supplement to the Southwestern Historical Quarterly, containing 
many articles on social, economic, and political phases of Texas 
history. Current numbers can be bought by addressing the maga¬ 
zine, at Austin. 

Winkler, E. W. (compiler and editor), Platforms of Political Parties 
in Texas (University of Texas Press, Austin, 1916). Seven 
hundred pages of source material on the political history of Texas. 

Wooten, Dudley G., A Complete History of Texas for Schools and 
Colleges (William G. Scarff, Dallas, 1899). A well organized 
well written textbook for advanced students. Unfortunately it is 
out of print. 



INDEX 


Agrarian Crusade, the, 515 
Agriculture, 117, 120, 128, 132, 417; in 
West Texas, 618 
Aguajes, Indians, 53 
Aizes, Indians, 46 
Alamo, 34; fall of, 262, 323 
Alcalde, duties of, 112 
Alcaldes, the Court of, 106 
Aldasora, Ambrosio, 58 
Alibamo, Indians, 47 
Allen, A. C., 551 
Allen, Ebenezer, 372 
Allen, J. K., 218 
Alley, Rawson, 112 
Almonte, J. N., account of siege of 
Alamo, 266; at San Jacinto, 303; 
report on Texas, 418, 474 
Anahuac, founding of, 122; troubles 
at, 161, 165, 177, 317 
Anderson, Kenneth W., 396 
Andrews, Robert, 71 
Annexation, to the United States, 
Texas vote on, 347; the United 
States rejects, 368, 369; offers an¬ 
nexation, 370; last stage of, 375; 
treaty of, 377; joint resolution for, 

378; annexation completed, 389 
April, 6, 1830, Law of, 87; turns 
Texans against Mexico, 159; petition 
for repeal, 168, 170, 188; repeal of, 
172; Austin’s argument against, 183- 
188; Wharton’s argument against, 
188-193 

Archer, Branch T., president of Con¬ 
sultation, 215; commissioner to the 
United States, 215; Railroad and 
Navigation Company, 551 
Arciniega, Miguel, 231 
Army Posts in Texas, 583, 589 
Austin, selection of, for capital of 
Texas, 354 

Austin, Henry, 170; letter, 212 
Austin, Moses, plans to plant a colony 
in Texas, 59, 117, 127; application 
for colonization contract, 60; hard¬ 
ships oo journey, 62; contract with 

645 


colonists, 62; death, 63; character¬ 
ization of, 63 

Austin, Stephen F., contributions of, 
79 , 115, 183, 194 , 209; sketch of, 147- 
158; reluctance to undertake colon¬ 
ization of Texas, 63, 147; location 
of colony, 67; beginning of settle¬ 
ment, 69; mission to Mexico, 71, 81, 
171; discusses powers of empresario, 
79-85; devotion to the colonists, 84, 
119, 128, 155, 157; his powers, 103- 
iii, 151; his civil and criminal codes, 
105; land fees, 109, 151; loyalty to 
Mexico, 131, 155, 162, 187; on char¬ 
acter of the colonists, 137, 149, 152; 
his aims, 148, 155, 160; on annexa¬ 
tion to the United States, 168; on 
Mexican political parties, 168, 175, 
210; on Convention of 1833,171-173; 
imprisonment in Mexico, 173, 175; 
approves Consultation, 179, 209-212; 
on judiciary system, 197; speech at 
Brazoria, 209-212; commissioner to 
the United States, 215; Speech at 
Louisville, 219; commands Texas 
volunteers, 225; candidate for presi¬ 
dency of Texas, 347 

Austin’s colony, government of, 103, 
160; population of, 118, 127 

Austina, proposed town, 62 

Ayuntamiento, duties of, hi 


Baker, Mosely, burns San Felipe, 299; 
Railroad and Navigation Company, 
551 

Ballinger, W. P., attempts to arrange 
terms of surrender for Texas, 497 
Barker, Eugene C., contributions of, 
3, 59, 103, 147, 159, 262, 345 
Barrett, D. C, opposes independence, 

215 

Bastrop, Baron de, befriends Moses 
Austin, 60; commissioner of Aus¬ 
tin’s colony, 82 

Bastrop, municipality of, created, 174 




646 


INDEX 


Beales, John Charles, 89; colony of, 
101 

Bean, Peter Ellis, 8 
Bee, Barnard E., mission to Mexico, 
360 

Belknap, incendiary fire, 467 
Bell, Josiah H., assists Austin, 67, 71, 
105; receives land grant, 68 69 
Bell, Thomas B., 144 
Bexar, Instructions of, to deputy in 
Spanish Cortes, 53-57 (See San 
Antonio ) 

Black Jack Grove, incendiary fire, 467 
Bolton, Herbert E., contribution of, 
17; locates La Salle’s settlement in 
Texas, 17-26; locates La Salle’s 
death, 4, 19 
Bonham, J. B., 265 

Bostick, Sion R., captures Santa Anna, 
335 

Bradburn, John Davis, 161; expulsion 
from Anahuac, 165 

Brazoria, municipality of, 132; insur¬ 
rection at, 164; dinner and ball at, 
212 

Breedlove, James W., 79 
Brenham, R. F., in Santa Fe Expe¬ 
dition, 363 

Briscoe, Andrew, 177, 317 
Brooks, John Sowers, letters from 
Goliad, 263, 281 

Bryan, Guy M., in Congress, 461; in 
Marshall Conference, 493 
Bryan, Moses Austin, at San Jacinto, 
303 

Bryan, William, services to Texas, 
345 

Buffalo Bayou, Brazos and Colorado 
Railroad, 553 

Bunton, J. W., in Convention of 1836, 
247 

Burleson, Edward, reports capture of 
San Antonio, 228; at San Jacinto, 
301, 306, 307 

Burnet, David G., 89, 90, 92; contribu¬ 
tion of, 199; resolutions by, 182; 
on judiciary system, 199-208; dif¬ 
ficulties of presidency, 345; message 
to Congress, 347; acting President, 
355; opposes secession, 473; elected 
to United States Senate, 508 
Burton, Harley True, contribution of, 
599 

Burton, J. W., selects Austin for cap¬ 
ital of Texas, 354 
Butler, Anthony, 172 


Cado, Indians, customs of, 44 
Caldwell, Mathew, 365 
Camels, used in army transportation 
in Texas, 587 

Cameron, John, 89; colony of, 99; ne¬ 
gotiation with Cherokees, 219 
Campaign of 1835, the, 221 
Campbell, Isaac, selects site for capital 
of Texas, 354 

Campos, Juan Vicente, 89; colony of, 
101 

Canby-Buckner Convention, the, 497 
Canfield, Alanson W., editor, 397 
Carbajal, J. M., delegate to Conven¬ 
tion of 1836, 259 

Cardenas, Manuel Joseph de, maps 
Texas coast, 20-21 

Caro, Ramon Martinez, comment on 
Santa Anna’s report of the Alamo, 
270 

Carson, Samuel P., in Convention of 
1836, 247, 248 
Cartwright, Jesse, 145 
Castaneda, Carlos E., contribution of, 
308 

Cattle industry, 133, 550, 599, 609, 612, 
619 

Central Committee, calls Convention 
of 1833, 169 
Chadwick, J. M., 279 
Chambers, Thomas J., 89; colony of, 
100 

Character, of early settlers, 119, 127, 
129, 130, 135-139, 152 
Chato Indians, 47 

Cherokees, settlement in East Texas, 
214; promised land by Consultation, 
216, 219; expulsion from Texas, 398 
Childress, George C., sketch of, 235- 
238, 249 

Cholera, in Texas, 173 
Christy, William, assists Texans at 
New Orleans, 219 
Civil War, Texas during, 486, 491 
Clark, Amos, 396 

Clark, R. C., contributions of, 10, 27 
Clark, William, 396 
Clarksville, economic history of, 550 
Cocos, Indians, 48 

Coleman, R. M., in Convention of 1836. 
247 

Coles, John P., 105; letter to Anthony 
Butler, 172 
Coleto, battle of, 277 
Collinsworth, George M., report of 
capture of Goliad, 227 



INDEX 


647 


Collinsworth, James W., 235; in Con¬ 
vention of 1836, 247, 248; Commis¬ 
sioner to the United States, 367; 
Railroad and Navigation Company, 
551 

Colonization contracts, 81, 84, 86-102, 
89; form of 90; boundaries of, 91- 
101 

Colonization Laws, 73-78; 81, 83, 86; 

Austin’s agency in passage, 149 
Comanches, Indians, 50, 54, 202; wor¬ 
ship a meteorite, 126 
Commerce, 118, 127, 133, 159, 164, 418, 
547 

Commissioner, land, duties of, 87 
Compromise of 1850, Texas in, 406 
Concepcion, mission of, 31, 43 
Conchate, Indians, 47 
Confederate army, break-up in Texas, 
493-499 

Consultation, meetings of, 214 
Conrad, Edward, sketch of, 235-240 
Constitution of the Republic of Texas, 
framing of, 246; analysis of, 255; 
official copy of, 258 
Convention of 1832, 168 
Convention of 1833, 169, 194-208 
Convention of 1836, 246 
Convention of 1845, members of, 391 
Convention of 1866, 508, 527 
Convention of 1868, 510 
Cooke, Louis P., selects site for capi¬ 
tal, 354 

Cooke, William G., in Santa Fe Ex¬ 
pedition, 363 

Coronado, expedition of, in Texas, 4 
Cos, Martin Perfecto, surrenders San 
Antonio, 230 

Cotton, 117, 118, 120, 128, 132, 418; in 
West Texas, 623-625 
Cotton gins, 132 
Cotton picking record, 439 
Cotton Troubles, in Texas, during 
Civil War, 499-501 

Cowboy, the equipment of, 600; his 
work, 600-611 

Crane, R. C., contribution of, 581 
Crawford, William C., 396; in Con¬ 
vention of 1836, 247 
Crockett, George L., contribution of, 
394 . 

Cummins, James, 105 

Curlee, Abigail, contribution of, 417 

Cushing, E. W., editor, 397 

Dallas, incendiary fire in, 467 


Darnell, N. H., 397 
Davis, E. J., commands Unionist force 
in Texas, 489; on Texas Supreme 
Court, 509; in Convention of 1868, 
510; elected governor, 511 
Davis, Jefferson, camels in Texas, 587 
Decalaration of Independence, the 
Texan, drafting of, 234; the Dec¬ 
laration, 242 
Davis, Thomas, 112 
De Le6n, Alonso, search for La Salle’s 
fort, 5, 11, 20 

Denton, incendiary fires at, 467 
De Soto, expedition of, in Texas, 4 
DeWitt, Green, 86, 89; troubles with 
De Leon, 95; colony of, 141 
Dimmitt, Philip, commanding at 
Goliad, 217 

Donelson, A. J., mission to Texas to 
offer annexation, 371, 373, 379 
Douglas, Kelsey A., 396 
Dry land farming, 631 
Duke, Thomas M., 112; arrives in 
Texas, 70; Alcalde, 145 
Dolores, Nuestra Senora de los, mis¬ 
sion of, 31 

Dominguez, Juan, 89; colony of, 99 


Eastern Interior Provinces, defined, 
61; government of, 103 
East Texas, Spain occupies, 6, 7, 27- 
33; land titles in, 161; in politics, 
394 

Eastern Texas Railroad, 556 
Education, state of, 133, 202 
Edwards, Haden, 86, 89 
Elliot, Charles, British charge in 
Texas, 371 

Ellis, Powhatan, reports condition of 
Mexican army, 360 
Ellis, Richard, President of Conven¬ 
tion, 235, 247 

Emigrant's Guide, newspaper, 214 
Empresario, powers and duties de¬ 
scribed, 79-85; boundaries of con¬ 
tracts, 91-101 

England, opposed to annexation of 
Texas by the United States, 370, 
380, 386 

English language, use of, legalized, 174 
Espada, San Francisco de, mission of, 
43 

Everett, Stephen H., 235, 396; in Con¬ 
vention of 1836, 247 
Exeter, Richard, 89; colony of, 101 



648 


INDEX 


Exeter and Wilson, empresario con¬ 
tracts of, 79, 89, 101 

Fannin, James W., approves Mata- 
moros expedition, 217; fails to rein¬ 
force Alamo, 263; Goliad campaign, 
273; capitulation, 279, 295 
Farmers’ Alliance, 515 
Farris, W. A., 235 
Fence cutting, 619 

Filisola, Vicente, 89; colony of, 100 
Finances, of the Texas revolution, 219, 
347, 348; of the Republic, 351, 355, 
356, 405; of the State, 1846-1861, 
409; 1865-1915, 527 

Fisher, George, customs collector, 163 
Fisher, John, in Convention of 1836, 
247 

Flanagan, J. W., United States Sena¬ 
tor, 511 

Flournoy, George M., calls secession 
convention, 477 

Forbes, John, 396; negotiation with 
Cherokees, 219 

Ford, John S., 396; calls secession con¬ 
vention, 477; captures Brownsville, 
489 

France, claims of, to Texas, 4, 6, 11- 
13, 18, 27; opposes annexation of 
Texas by the United States, 370, 380 
Freedmen’s Bureau, in Texas, 503, 509 
Frontiersmen, characterization of, 82, 
no 

Gaines, James, sketch of, 235-237; in 
Convention of 1836, 247 
Gainesville, incendiary fire, 467 
Galveston, port of, established, 162 
Galveston Bay and Texas Land Com¬ 
pany, 93 

Galveston, Houston and Henderson 
Railroad, 555 

Galveston and Red River Railway, 
554 

Gazley, Thomas J., 225 
General Council, on capture of San 
Antonio, 232 
Georgia Battalion, 218 
Gilleland, Daniel, 69 
Golden Circle, Knights of, 474 
Goliad, founding of, 26; condition of, 
54, 66, 117, 132, 202; demands re¬ 
forms, 169; declaration of inde¬ 
pendence, 216; capture by Texans, 
226; campaign and massacre, 273- 
297; letters from, 281 


Gonzales, municipality of, 132, 133; 

battle of, 180, 221; burning of, 298 
Goodnight, Charles, contribution of, 
612 

Goodnight Trail, the, 612, 614 
Grange, the, as a political factor in 
Texas, 514; on railroad legislation, 
522; on interest rates, 524 
Granger, Gordon, proclaims slaves 
free in Texas, 498, 503, 508 
Grant, James, 90, colony of, 101; in 
Matamoros expedition, 217 
Gray, W. F., Diary of, 235, 238, 239, 
248, 254 

Grayson, P. W., 225; Commissioner to 
the United States, 367 
Grasshoppers, in West Texas, 620 
Gregg, John, represents Texas in 
Montgomery Convention, 484 
Green, Thomas J., 365, 551 
Greer, James K., contribution of, 234 
Greer, John A., 396 
Grimes, Jesse, in Convention of 1836, 
247 

Grist mills, 132 

Groce, Jared E., 144; large slave 
owner, 419 

Guadalupe, Nuestra Senora de, mis¬ 
sion of, 31 

Gutierrez, Bernardo, 8 

Hall, W. Sims, army contractor, 214 
Hamilton, A. J., opposes secession, 
457; appointed provisional governor 
of Texas, 508, 527; in Convention of 
1868, 510; defeated for governor, 
511 

Hamilton, Morgan, in Convention o-f 
1868, 510 

Hamilton, Robert, in Convention of 
1836, 247 

Hardeman, Bailey, 235, 237; in Con¬ 
vention of 1836, 247 
Hardships, of early immigrants, 118, 
143 

Harris, Dilue, contribution of, 316 
Harrison, Jonas, death of, 396 
Hatcher, Mattie Austin, contributions 
of, 34 , 42 

Hawkins, Joseph H., befriends Austin, 
64; partnership with Austin, 68 
Hemphill, John, represents Texas in 
Montgomery Convention, 484 
Henderson, incendiary fires, 467 
Henderson, J. Pinckney, 396; negoti¬ 
ates annexation treaty, 377 



INDEX 


649 


Henderson, Mary Virginia, contribu¬ 
tion of, 86 

Hewetson, James, 89; colony of, 97 
Hockley, George W., at San Jacinto, 
306 

Holden, W. G, contribution of, 618 
Holsinger, Juan Jose, letter to Whar¬ 
ton, 281 

Homestead Law, 353 
Horses, trade in wild, 56 
Horton, A. C, 218, 274, 398, 551; se¬ 
lects site for capital of Texas, 354 
Houston, Sam, disapproves of Austin, 
173; reassures Cherokees, 214, 219; 
elected commander-in-chief, 215; in 
Convention of 1836, 247, 248; orders 
Fannin to retreat, 273; San Jacinto 
campaign, 298; report of San Ja¬ 
cinto, 305; president of Texas, 347; 
Indian policy, 349; moves govern¬ 
ment from Austin, 364; relations 
with Mexico, 367; on annexation, 
369; opposes secession, 454, 457, 463, 
478; governor of Texas, 460 
Houston Tap and Brazoria Railroad, 
555 

Huff, George, 146 

Hunt, Memucan, minister to the 
United States, 368 

Ibarbo, Gil, founds Nacogdoches, 7 
Immigrants, hardships of, 118, 143; 
character of, 119, 127, 129, 130, 135- 
139; loyalty to Mexico, 130; social 
conditions among, 140-146; in West 
Texas, 621 

Immigration, encouragement of from 
Europe, 120, 128, 130, 132; into West 
Texas, 621 

Incendiary fires in Texas on eve of 
Civil War, 467 
Indented servants, 119 
Indianola Railroad, 556 
Indians, customs of, 43 - 53 ; depreda¬ 
tions of, 141; policy of Republic 
toward, 349 

Ingram, Ira, 112; leads Goliad declara¬ 
tion of independence, 217; reports 
capture of Goliad, 226 
Irion, Robert A., 396 
Irish colonies, founding of, 124; sup¬ 
port independence at Goliad, 217 
Iron Clad Oath, the, 509 

Jack, Patrick C., 225; imprisoned by 
Bradburn, 165 


Jack, William H., Secretary of State, 
260 

Jackson, Andrew, advises delay in 
recognizing Texas, 368 
Jackson, Humphrey, 112 
J A Ranch, the, 599-611 
Jefferson, decline of, 549 
Johnson, Francis W., in the Matamo- 
ros expedition, 217; in capture of 
San Antonio, 228 
Johnston, Albert Sidney, 363 
Jones, Anson, President of Texas, 
357; submits annexation, 373, 381, 

385 

Judiciary system, 104-106, 113, 174, 
197-208 

Karankawa Indians, hostility of, 140 
Karnes, Henry, at San Jacinto, 307 
Kaufman, incendiary fires, 467 
Kaufman, David S., 396 
Keeran, Claude, 22, 24, 25 
Kerr, James, 235; reports capture of 
Goliad, 226 

Kimble, H. S., 235, 247 
Kincheloe, William, receives land 
grant, 68 

Knights of the Golden Circle, 474 
Ku Klux Klan, 510 
Kuykendall, Abner, 69 
Kuykendall, Joseph, 69 
Kuykendall, Robert, 69 

Labor conditions, in Texas following 
Civil War, 501 

Labor contracts, 119, 130, 156 
Lamar, Mirabeau B., at San Jacinto, 
302, 304, 307; secretary of War, 346; 
president, 350; Indian policy, 351; 
public education, 352; Santa Fe ex¬ 
pedition, 362; opposes annexation, 
376 

Land, speculation, 79, 177; bounty 
laws, 218; in Convention of 1836, 
250; grants to railroads, 573 
Land commissioner, duties of, 87 
Land system, Austin’s plan, 67, 69, 79, 
107; general, 118, 128, 129, 151 
Lang, William W., leads Texas 
Grange, 518 

La Salle, Robert Cavalier de, expedi¬ 
tion to Texas, 4, 10, 18; death of, 4 
Leftwich, Robert, 89 
Le Grande, A., surveyor, 101 
Leon, Martin de, 89; colony of, 94; 
troubles with DeWitt, 95 



650 


INDEX 


Liberty, municipality of, 132, 162 
Linares, San Miguel de, mission of, 31 
Linn, John J., 225, 235; in Convention 
of 1836; 259 
Lipanes, Indians, 51, 54 
Lipscomb, Abner, 403 
Little, William, 70 

Lively, Austin’s schooner, 68, 69; the 
story of, 70 

Local History, suggestions for study 
and writing, 633 

Loreto, Nuestra Senora de, fort of, 26 
Louisiana, purchase of, 7; boundaries, 
7 

Lovell, Benjamin Drake, 89; colony of, 
98 

Lovelace, Edward, assists Austin, 70 

McFarland, William, 396 
McGloin, James, 89; colony of, 97 
McGuffin’s, Hugh, 60 
McKinney, Collin, sketch of, 235-240; 

in Convention of 1836, 247 
McKinney, Thomas F., financial agent, 
214; railroad and navigation com¬ 
pany, 55i 

McLeod, Hugh, in Santa Fe Expedi¬ 
tion, 363 

McMullen, John, 89; colony of, 97 
Madero, J. Francisco, arrested, 162 
Magee, Augustus, 8 
Mail service, petition for improvement 
of, 170 

Manchola, Rafael, 96 
Marcy, R. B., exploration of West 
Texas, 585 

Marriage customs, 145, 146 
Marshall, Conference of governors at, 
493 

Martin, Roscoe C., contribution of, 514 
Martinez, Governor Antonio, approves 
Austin’s colonization plans, 65 
Mason, John T., 253 
Massanet, Father Damian, founds first 
Texas mission, 5, 13 
Matagorda, petition for port of, 57; 
founding of, 123; municipality 
created, 174 

Matamoros Expedition, 217 
Memphis, El Paso and Pacific Rail¬ 
road, 557 

Menard, Michael B., in Convention of 

1836, 247 

Menifee, William, in Convention of 
1836, 247; selects site for capital, 354 
Mesquite, uses of, 125 


Meteorite, on upper Brazos, 126 
Mexia, Jose Antonio, expedition to 
Texas, 167 

Mexico, political disorders of, 81, 118, 
167, 174, 196, 210; refuses to recog¬ 
nize Texan independence, 361, 367; 
raids on Texas, 363; conditional 
recognition of Texas independence, 
37 i» 385; trade during Civil War, 490 
Middleton, Annie, contribution of, 375 
Mier Expedition, the, 365 
Milam, Benjamin R., 89, 94; death at 
San Antonio, 228 
Military board, in Texas, 488 
Millard, Henry, frames provisional 
government, 215; at San Jacinto, 306 
Miller, E. T., contribution of, 409, 527 
Miller, James B., 177 
Miller, S. R., 225 

Missions, founded by Spain in Texas, 
5, 6, 13, 28, 31, 34 , 38 , 43 J life in, 
34 - 4 L 57 

Monclova, political rivalry with Sal¬ 
tillo, 174, 176 

Morfit, Henry M., mission to Texas, 
368 

Morgan, James, 321 
Moore, E. W., 358 

Moore, John H., commanding at Gon¬ 
zales, 223 

Morris, Colonel R. C., 218, 231 
Motley, William, in Convention of 
1836, 247 

Musquiz, Ramon, 231; efforts to pacify 
insurgents, 166 


Nacazil, Indians, 48 

Nacogdoches, founded, 7; description 
of, 122, 132, 202 
Nacogdochitos, Indians, 46 
Nadacos, Indians, 49 
Natchitoches, French settlement at, 6 
Navarro, incendiary fire, 467 
Navarro, J. A., in Convention of 1836, 
249; in Santa Fe Expedition, 363 
Navy, of Texas, 348, 349, 357, 358 
Negro question, following Civil War, 
SOI 

Neill, J. C, in capture of San Antonio, 
228 

New York and Texas Land Company, 
579 

Nolan, Philip, 7 

Non-Partisan Tax-Payers’ Conven¬ 
tion, the, 512 



INDEX 


651 


Ochiltree, William B., 396; represents 
Texas in Montgomery Convention, 

484 

Oldham, W. S., represents Texas in 
Montgomery Convention, 484 
Opelousas Road, 65 
Orcoquisac, Indians, 47 
Ord, E. O. C., report on West Texas, 
589 

Padilla, Juan Antonio, 89; report on 
Indians of Texas, 42-53; colony of, 

100 

Parker, W. B., report on Texas, 586 
Parmer, Martin, in Convention of 
1836, 247, 248 

Peach Point Plantation, 423 
Pease, Elisha M., appointed governor 
of Texas, 509; resigns, 511 
Perry, James F., 171; plantation of, 
417 

Perry, Stephen S., journal of, 441 
Piedras, Colonel Jose de las, makes 
peace at Anahuac, 165; retires from 
Nacogdoches, 168 
Pilot Point, incendiary fire, 467 
Pollard, Amos, 225 

Ponton, Andrew, alcalde of Gonzales, 
221 

Population, 118, 125, 132 
Potter, Robert, in Convention of 1836, 
247, 248 

Potter, R. M., 259 

Potts, Charles S., Contribution of, 540 
Power, James, 89; colony of, 97; in 
Convention of 1836, 247 
Prairie dogs, in West Texas, 620 
Punta, Nuestra Senora de los Dolores, 
mission of, 38 

Purnell, John G., 89; colony of, 98 

Quichas, Indians, 49 

Raguet, Henry, 396 
Railroad Commission, of Texas, 522 
Railroads, public aid to construction, 
531, 566-577; building of, 551 
Ram6n, Diego, 6, 29 
Ramon, Domingo, leads settlement to 
East Texas, 6, 28 

Ramsdell, Charles W., contribution of, 
452, 486, 490 
Ranch Life, 599 - 6 11 
Rangers, the Texas, 215, 592-598 
Rather, Ethel Zivley, contribution of, 
221 


Reagan, John H., in Congress, 461; 
wants a Southern Convention, 472; 
represents Texas in Montgomery 
Convention, 484 

Reconstruction Convention, in Texas, 
5io 

Reconstruction in Texas, 490, 506 
Red Lander, newspaper, 397 
Religious, toleration, 174 
Republic of Texas, Survey of Home 
affairs of, 345; survey of Foreign 
affairs of, 359 

Richardson, Rupert N., contribution 
of, 246 

Richardson, Stephen, 146 
Richmond, a negro slave, 61 
River Transportation, in Texas, 542 
Roberts, Oran M., 396; in secession 
movement, 455, 477, 481; elected to 
United States Senate, 508 
Robertson, Sterling C., colony of, 93 
Robison, Joel W., captures Santa 
Anna, 303 

Robinson, Andrew, settles in Texas, 

69 

Robinson, James W., lieutenant-gover¬ 
nor, 215; mission to Mexico, 367 
Rogers, W. P., calls secession conven¬ 
tion, 477 

Rose, A. J., heads Texas Grange, 522 
Round-up, description of, 600, 604-611 
Rowe, Joseph, 396 

Royuela, Jose M., 89; colony of, 101 
Ruby, G. T., withdraws from Recon¬ 
struction Convention, 510 
Ruiz, Francisco, retires from upper 
Brazos, 168; in Convention of 1836, 
249; fall of Alamo, 271 
“Runaway Scrape,” the, 316 
Rusk, Thomas J., 218, 396; in Conven¬ 
tion of 1836, 247, 248; at San Jac¬ 
into 303, 308; in Convention of 1845, 
391 

St. Denis, Louis Juchereau de, expedi¬ 
tion to Texas, 6, 28 
St. Louis, Fort, founded by La Salle, 
4 , H, 25 

Saltillo, political rivalry with Mon- 
clova, 174, 176 

San Antonio, founding of, 6; descrip¬ 
tion of, 43 , 53 , 66 , 117, 125, 132, 202; 
petition for reforms, 169; opposes 
Convention of 1833, 170; capture by 
Texans, 228, 230 



652 


INDEX 


San Antonio Zeitung, abolitionist 
paper, 475 

San Antonio and Mexican Gulf Rail¬ 
road, 556 

San Augustine, municipality of, 
created, 174 

San Bernard, port of, created, 162 
San Felipe, de Austin, founding of, 
123; Ayuntamiento created, hi; 
work of Ayuntamiento, 111-114; 
population, 132; petitions for tariff 
reform, 164; calls convention of 
1832, 168; burning of, 299 
San Francisco de los Tejas, mission of, 
13, 28 

San Francisco, mission of, 31 
San Jacinto, Houston’s campaign of, 
298, the battlefield, 331 
San Jose, mission of, 43 
San Joseph, mission of, 31 
San Juan Capistrano, mission of, 43 
San Patricio, municipality of, created, 
174 

San Pedro, Indians, 48 
Sandbo, Anna Irene, contribution of, 
459 , 476 

Santa Anna; Antonio Lopez de, Tex¬ 
ans declare for, 167; joins Central¬ 
ists, 175; declares friendship for 
Texans, 211; prepares for invasion 
of Texas, 219; at Alamo, 268, 270; 
Goliad massacre, 297; burns Harris¬ 
burg, 300; captured at San Jacinto, 
303; account of San Jacinto, 308; 
asks Jackson to intervene, 346; re¬ 
leases Santa Fe prisoners, 363 
Santa Fe Expedition, the Texan, 
362 

Santa Maria, mission of, 14, 28 
Saucedo, Jose Antonio, political chief, 

105 

Sawmills, 122, 132 
Scurry, Richardson, 396 
Scurry, William R., 396 
Schools, 133, 202 

School funds, loans from, to railroads, 

568 

Secession Convention, in Texas, 476 
Secession Movement in Texas, 452, 
459; opposition to, 471 
Sectionalism, 394, 581 
Secrest, Washington, captures Santa 
Anna, 335 

Seguin, Joseph Erasmo, 64, 170 
Sheridan, Philip H., conditions in 
Texas, 498, 509 


Sherman, Sidney, at San Jacinto, 301, 
306 

Slavery, 119, 129, 156; in Convention 
of 1836, 254 

Slave plantation, history of, 417 
Slave trade, 349, 461 
Smith, Ashbel, on annexation of 
Texas, 373, 382; in Civil War, 497 
Smith, Benjamin F., 227 
Smith, Dennis A., speculating in Texas 
land, 79 

Smith, Deaf, 300, 301, 334 
Smith, E. Kirby, calls conference of 
governors, 493 

Smith, Henry, provisional governor of 
Texas, 215; quarrel with council, 
216; appeal for reinforcements for 
Alamo, 263; candidate for presi¬ 
dency, 347 

Smith, Ruby Cumby, contribution of, 
273 

Smithwick, Noah, contribution of, 140 
Snively Expedition, the, 365 
Social conditions, in early Texas, 140- 
146, 212 

Somervell, Alexander, 365 
South Carolina Resolutions on Seces¬ 
sion, 463 

Southern Pacific Railroad, 557 
Speculators, in Texas during Civil 
War, 491 

Stage Coach lines, in Texas, 545 
Stapp, Elijah, in Convention of 1836, 
247 

Starr, James H., 396 
Stewart, Charles B., in Convention of 
1836, 247 

Sublett, Henry W., 396 
Swisher, James G., 231 
Sylvester, James A., captures Santa 
Anna, 303 

Tahuacanos, Indians, 52 
Tahuayases, Indians, 53 
Tancahues, Indians, 52 
Tariff, administration of, in Texas, 
162, 164; petitions for exemption, 
168, 170 

Tax-Payers’ Convention, the, 512 
Taylor, Charles S., 396 
Tejas, customs of the, 31, 48 
Tenorio, Captain Antonio, at Anahuac, 
1 77 , 317 

Tenoxtitlan, founding of, 124 
Teran, Manual Mier y, 122; puts gar¬ 
risons in Texas, 161; condemns 




INDEX 


653 


Fisher's policy, 164; efforts to gov¬ 
ern justly, 166 
Terrell, George W., 396 
Texas, descriptions of, 42, 53, 66, 71, 
115-134, 184; government of, 103- 
114, 174, 210; trade with Mexico 
during Civil War, 490 
Texas and New Orleans Railroad, 
555 

Texas Railroad, Navigation, and 
Banking Company, 551 
Texas-New Mexico boundary dispute, 
406 

Thomas, David, in Convention of 1836, 
247 

Thorn, Frost, 89; colony of, 98 
Throckmorton, J. W., opposes seces¬ 
sion, 455, 483; governor, 508, 527; 
removed from office, 509 
Toby, Thomas, and Brother, agents of 
Texas, 345 
Trail driving, 612 

Transportation, in Texas, 540; river 
improvement, 542; overland travel 
and trade, 544 

Travis, William B., imprisoned by 
Bradburn, 165; attack on Anahuac, 
177 , 317 ; at Alamo, 218, 262, 264 
Treasury State, at Austin, robbed, 496 
Treat, James, mission to Mexico, 361 
Turtle Bayou Resolutions, 165, 167 
Twiggs, D. E., surrenders San An¬ 
tonio, 456 

Twin Sisters, cannon, 300 
Tyler, John, proposes annexation of 
Texas, 369 

Ugartechea, Colonel Domingo, in bat¬ 
tle of Velasco, 166; commandant of 
Texas, 177; demands cannon at 
Gonzales, 221 

Urrea, Jose, capitulation of Fannin, 
279; Goliad Campaign, 291 

Valero, San Antonio de, mission of, 34 
Varner, Mrs. Martin, cooking, 143 
Van Buren, Martin, opposes annexa¬ 
tion of Texas, 368 
Van Zandt, Isaac, negotiates annexa¬ 
tion treaty, 377 

Vehlein and Company, 89, 90, 92; 
colony of, 98 

Velasco, Battle of, 166; Treaty of, 346 
Vidaizes, Indians, 46 
Vigilance Committees, 468 


Walker, Richard S., 396 
Walker, Senator R. J., proposes an¬ 
nexation of Texas, 376 
Wallace, B. C., 279 
Wallace, B. Rush, 396 
Wallace, J. W. E., in battle of Gon¬ 
zales, 223 

Waller, Edwin, in Convention of 1836, 
247 

Ward, William, commanding the 
Georgia Battalion, 218 
Washington, Texas, description of, 246 
Washington County Railroad, 555 
Waterloo, site of, selected for capital, 
354 

Waul, T. N., represents Texas in 
Montgomery Convention, 484 
Wavell, Arthur G., 89; colony of, 98 
Waxahachie, incendiary fire, 467 
Webb, J. S., 25; mission to Mexico, 
362 

Webb, W. P., contribution of, 592, 633 
West, Claiborne, in Convention of 
1836, 247 

West Texas, since 1845, 581; agricul¬ 
ture in, 618 

Wharton, John A., 173; causes for 
taking up arms, 215; at San Jacinto, 
303 

Wharton, William H., contribution of, 
188; president of Convention of 
1833, 170; commissioner to United 
States, 215, 368 
Wheeler, Royall T., 396 
White, Sam A., 274 
White, Thomas, contribution of, 135 
Wigfall, Louis T., elected to Senate, 
462; favors secession, 474, 484 
Williams, Samuel M., partner of Aus¬ 
tin, 132; buys naval vessels, 357 
Williamson, R. M., explains insurrec¬ 
tion, 178, 181 

Wilson, Rev. Francis, founder of col¬ 
lege, 399 

Wilson, Stephen J., 89; colony of, 100 
Winkler, E. W., contribution of, 405 
Women, hardships of pioneers, 142 
Woodbury, John L., 89, 92, 98 
Wooten, Dudley G., contribution of, 
214, 298, 506 

Woll, Adrian, invades Texas, 364 

Yuganis, Indians, 46 

Zavala, Lorenzo de, 89, 90, 92, 247, 
249 , 303 


























































































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